Music of the Moment
by HuaFeiHua
Summary: "You know what, Momo? No. No, I am not okay. I walked into junior year expecting to have a good time and be a good drum major, but what did I get instead? A uncooperative assistant council, tremendous academic pressure, and a trombone player who only ever plays Careless Whisper on his instrument!" (KamiJirou school band/soulmate AU)
1. Under My Skin

**Word Count: **2,306

* * *

"So why did you join band?"

Denki bit his lip and thought quietly, not fully aware of all the people also in the circle staring intently at him as a soft smile came across his face. "To find my soulmate," he replied, a wisp of a sigh upon his breath.

"Too unrealistic. Settle for 'parents forced you to' like the rest of us," someone he didn't yet know called, and the other kids tittered with laughter.

Denki flushed slightly, but in the sweltering July heat, no one paid it any mind. His eyes focused on the world around him again, taking in other kids in the circle in little snippets— a pair of red eyes here, a black bracelet around a skinny arm there, a white t-shirt with an indie band logo he didn't recognize. Yet, his mind had become like a pond with a stone thrown in, hazy and disoriented and full of distorted ripples.

He had an explanation; he'd often recited it in his head over and over again, repeating the mantra in time to his heartbeat before concerts last year. It was just— it was just— it was hot outside, and he wasn't familiar with all of these people, and it was the first day of band camp, and they were right, he _was_ being unrealistic and cliché and—

"My sister was the drum major a couple years ago, so I joined band in middle school because I wanted to be like her."

…And already, they were moving on without him.

(It was okay, he figured despite his sinking stomach. He knew deep within the reasoning he made up wasn't actually why he _joined_ band, only why he'd _stayed.)_

A bead of sticky sweat rolled down Denki's forehead as he held in the urge to sigh. (It was harder than you might think. It was rather like holding in a sneeze: you could hold it in, technically, but it would be unsatisfying.) Well, as long as his mind was wandering, may as well let it tread where it wanted. There was nothing more fun than zoning out and having an internal monologue during bonding time on day one of band camp, right?

Right.

Oh, but there was nothing to really monologue about, was there? (He wondered if they'd be in different groups tomorrow.) His head was _still_ feeling fuzzy, and the air was _still_ feeling suffocatingly hot. (Were people giving him funny looks now? He wondered why.) Were they going to get back to work soon? (He'd forgotten his water, but knowing the memes, that probably didn't matter.)

"Hey, uh, dude?" someone said to him, but they sounded far away and distant, like he was sleeping at the bottom of a lake and their voice, all garbled and warped, was just making it to him now. (Were they even talking to him? Probably not.) "You don't look so good."

"Do I?" Denki answered dazedly, unaware that he had also just thought they weren't talking to him. "I feel fine, I swear."

A sigh, and the sound of soles scraping against the pavement. "Let me see him," a girl said, and vaguely, he recognized it as the leader girl. Was she drum major? Band president?

He couldn't quite recall because he brain didn't really want to work on him, but that was normal. All he had right now was a pair of wide, concerned, blue-green eyes up in his face and a cool hand on his forehead. (Hehehe that felt nice.)

"All right, let's see if you can get up," the girl said, grabbing hold of his hand and starting to yank him up.

Semiconscious, Denki followed her lead, but his legs felt like jelly, and oh god, he couldn't see, the whole world had gone black (but that was okay sometimes it just did that when he got up too quickly), and what were those muffled voices saying?

He couldn't quite hear.

* * *

"…Why did _you_ join band, I wonder?"

It sounded like he was underwater again, except this time he was rising to the surface, the voice he couldn't quite place growing clearer with every word she said. Confused, Denki scrabbled at his surroundings, pawing weakly at what was probably concrete and straining to sit up. All the world was still fuzzy, but his eyes were open and the black spots were fading away, and— what _happened_ to him, actually?

"Oh, you're awake," the girl commented as Denki managed to pull himself into a sitting position. "You fainted."

Groggy (or maybe just disoriented), Denki blinked several times as he actively tried to process her words. "…What?" he said, his vision just now coming into focus again.

"You _fainted,"_ the girl said, her deadpan eyes seemingly sparing him no pity. There was a scraping sound, and suddenly, Denki found a reusable water bottle shoved in his direction. "Probably the heat. _Seriously,_ who wears jeans to band camp?"

"At least they're not jorts," the blond boy weakly joked, taking her bottle in a daze and uncapping it carefully.

The girl rolled her eyes at him (seriously, she seemed so much less concerned about him than his group leader!) and pulled her legs underneath her to sit cross-legged. "Heatstroke is no joke, Pikachu. You're lucky Itsuka is stronger than she looks; she said you collapsed so suddenly, she almost accidentally let your head hit the ground." She paused to cock his head at him. "You know who I am, right?"

Denki nearly choked on his water, but he somehow managed to swallow in time and put the bottle down. "Yeah," he rasped, masking a choking cough. "You're, uh…"

His brain short-circuited now that he took the time to actually look at the girl. Not because she was astronomically pretty (because that _had_ happened to him before and he was _not_ proud of it), but because the cold water felt so _weird _in his gut compared to the thick, humid outside air that it was actually kind of a shock.

"That one alto sax player," he said (because that was all he could remember about her at the moment).

The girl sighed and shook her pretty, purple head. "The head drum major," she filled in. "Jirou Kyouka. Though, I _do_ play alto sax."

All right, all right, it seemed he was coming down from his high again. He could still feel his own pulse, but he felt like he was breathing normally again, and his brain didn't feel like it was full of socks anymore, which was good. Really, really good.

Denki capped the water bottle. "Yeah, I remember because I always thought you always stood out in the field shows for having really dark hair," he said, pulling one knee up to his chest as he glanced up at her.

Jirou stared at him evenly, her eyes as unfathomable and moody as a sea storm. "That's weird," she said shortly, breaking gaze, but not making any motion to take back her bottle. "But okay."

Denki wanted to puff his cheeks out and argue _no, that wasn't weird, it's really hard to see faces from up in the stands, you know,_ but she'd begun interrogating him before he could.

"What's your name?" she asked, abruptly turning her head to look at him again.

"Kaminari Denki," he answered, caught off-guard at the very least.

"What year are you in?"

"I'm going to be a junior?"

"Instrument?"

"Trombone—"

"How many years have you been in band?"

"This will be my third, but—"

"Why did you join band?"

His interjection was caught and killed in his throat, that feeling of this-is-totally-déjà-vu-but-not-actually-literally-déjà-vu hitting him _hard_ because this had. Literally been asked to him who knows how long ago now actually, he didn't know how long he'd been out, but that _did_ remind him—

"Wait, but who's watching your group?" Denki blurted, forgetting to answer as he started getting up. "And shouldn't I get back? I mean, can't miss out on the basics and stuff, right?"

"Sit down, Pikachu," Jirou said, her voice professional and commanding and stopping him better than that hand of hers gripping his wrist. "You're going to overexert yourself. We want you to learn and get good at marching, yes, but we're not sadists. We want you to be alive and okay first."

Denki obeyed, but that didn't mean he still wasn't concerned. "But what about your group?"

Jirou gave him another deadpan look. (He should probably get used to this.) "If you actually looked out into the parking lot, Pikachu, you would notice that everyone is still on break. You were out for two minutes, tops."

"Oh," the boy said, suddenly feeling very silly.

Jirou smothered a laugh with her hand. "It's okay," she said, her tone softening. "Nejire came to visit. She's watching my kids now, see?" She gestured over to her corner of the parking lot, and lo and behold! When Denki _actually, really looked,_ he could see the alumnus's baby blue hair bouncing around as the young woman skipped around.

"I see," Denki said, unsure of what else to say.

"So why did you join band?" she asked yet again, and really, should he have been surprised? He hadn't answered her the first time, after all.

(No, but he was anyway.) "Oh, well, um, I was put into instruments freshman year," he replied, scrambling for an answer that was both truthful and not the soulmate statement. "Like, I didn't even ask for it as an elective. My counselor just shoved me into the class because I guess metalworking was full or something. I don't really know."

Jirou didn't look particularly satisfied with that answer. "You could have just transferred out, you know. Why would you stay?"

Oh boy, Denki could feel his face flushing again already. "'Cause when I was trying to do that, I went to first period one morning with the band playing in my head and realized that my soulmate must be part of them."

Jirou cocked an eyebrow at him. "You realize that we mostly do rundowns of pregame in the first three weeks of school, right? Not much music, usually."

Denki shook his head. "No, but there was this fluke storm that day, so they were _inside practicing_ that day."

"If it was the national anthem, I hate to break it to you, Pikachu, but that doesn't exactly mean anything."

Denki opened his mouth to rebuttal, but caught his breath and shut his mouth when he remembered it _was in fact_ the national anthem he'd heard that fateful August morning. "Okay, but I'm pretty sure having a zero period band _and_ a director who lets everyone out after the bell because _rehearsal _is at least a little more specific to here."

"Here's a wild, wild concept: _there are many different high schools in many different time zones."_

Denki pouted at her. "Why are you taking all the fun out of this? What about _your_ soulmate?"

Jirou looked off to the side, her face unreadable except for a touch of embarrassment. "You kind of got me there," she admitted. "I'm pretty sure my soulmate's in band here too, because I heard beginning and concert band rehearsals when I was in class the last two years."

Denki couldn't help the triumphant grin that made its way onto his face upon hearing that. "See? You're just as bad as me." _(I can't believe I didn't think to remember hearing marching kids practice their field shows every time I woke up.)_

"But," she said sharply, flicking her eyes toward him, and they were cold and stony and set in their decision. "If and when I ever find out who they are, I am going to lecture the _hell_ out of them on practice etiquette."

Now it was Denki's turn to look at her with confusion. "Why, what happened?"

Jirou held up a finger, signalling for him to wait as she calmed down. (Clearly, she felt _very_ strongly about this.) "Every. Time. _Every time. E-ver-y_ time I practiced during lunch freshman year, there would be _trashy_ EDM music blasting in the back of my mind, which made it hard to concentrate, and _that's_ why I didn't get the sax solo in that year's field show."

Wow. Okay. That was intense.

Denki blinked once, twice, as a few of the rusted-out gears in his brain started turning. He had a pretty big EDM phase as a freshman, and there was always that one sax bit in everything for some reason—

OH?

WERE THEY?

_COULD _IT _BE?_

COULD _HE,_ KAMINARI "PIKACHU" DENKI, _POSSIBLY_ BE _SOULMATES_ WITH THE _DRUM MAJOR_ THAT HE MET _JUST NOW?_

(He didn't even give second thought to the fact that he automatically counted Jirou's nickname for him into his own name.)

THIS WAS _WILD,_ HE _HAD_ TO TELL HER— oh, except for the fact that she was going to lecture his last two brain cells away if she knew, especially now since it was fresh on her mind. Oh bother, bother, bother.

It would certainly be good to get such a lecture over soon, but that _look_ in her _eye_ just _terrified_ him.

Hmm… He _was_ excited about this, but Denki still had to admit to himself, he was a _coward._

He snuck a glance at the girl leering into the distance. Well, she was certainly something. That much he could tell already.

* * *

**_Author's Note i. _**_hi. so this is the promised main installment of _without you, life would Bb_. __to those of you new to Bb, the main catch of it is that it's a school band/soulmate au, where you can hear the same (instrumental) music playing in your head as whatever your soulmate is listening to at the time. (you can probably see why this is titled music of the moment now lol) they do attend american school here, not just bc that's what I'm more familiar with, but also bc i like the idea of them being first gen kids of immigrants. Why do they keep referring to each other by surname? Consider it a cultural byproduct of their parents' heritage. _

_they're in their junior year this time around, so it takes place between _three cents shy _(their soph year) and _fermata _(their senior year), and unlike the other parts of w/o you Bb out rn, this is gonna be a multichapterrrr. yeeeeee_

_but anyway, this is something i've been wanting to write for ages. leave a review if that's what you're into, and as always, have a greaaaaat daaaaayyy~~~_

* * *

**Next chronologically: **_Chapter 3_


	2. The Middle

**Previous chronologically: **_Chapter 5_

* * *

**Word Count: **1,321

* * *

Yikes, yikes, and _more yikes._ October had just begun, and yet the show still felt more like a recital than a performance. How had Togata managed the field show last year? How, how, _how?_ She wished she could ask him, but considering the circumstances, it didn't look like that was going to be possible for a while.

Kyouka screamed internally, but she somehow managed to plaster on a poker face as she checked her watch. Well, there wasn't the time to do anything about it if she wanted Yaomomo to get to AP Chem in time. (Considering how much she loved her best friend, there wasn't a chance she'd let them out late.)

She sighed as quietly as she could. "All right, guys, bring it in!" she barked, half-ignoring the collective sigh of relief that swept through the kids as they eased up and began to collect themselves in a huddle around her. Fighting the inner urge to pinch the bridge of her nose, she exhaled in a way that hoped could pass as just gathering herself before the band.

Kyouka put on a smile. "I saw some good work out there today! Clarinets, watch the spacing. Second and third trumpets, bring it out; we need that harmony, okay? Also, I'm still hearing someone blasting from the baritones. Don't do that, guys. Never play louder than you can play well." She paused to rack her brains. "Are there any more announcements? Oh, right—! Homecoming is coming up soon! Put your hearts into it—"

"—_and we'll look stellar!"_ some bassline member finished for her. Kyouka felt her cheeks flush in embarrassment; wow, was she really becoming that predictable that the whole band could predict her next word? Maybe she should quit the daily recitals at the end of practice and put some effort into her speeches herself, wow. "_Band dis-missed, thank you sir—" _they jokingly continued, but luckily for Kyo, the assistant drum major Bakugou stepped in.

"Shut up," he snapped, giving his snare drum a good _thwack!_ on the rim for emphasis. Its deafening crack silenced everyone for Kyouka.

"Thank you, Bakugou," Kyouka calmly said, to which Bakugou simply grunted. Now self-conscious, she began to rack her brains for something, _anything_ that needed announcing so that she wouldn't just lamely repeat what the bassline had just mocked.

She snapped, something suddenly falling into her head. "We're inside tomorrow because of the coming storm, so we're going to be deciding who we're backing for homecoming court!" She did her best impression of one of the narcs: "_Don't be laaaate!"_

"Kaminari," Sero snorted, just loud enough to be heard by the entire band.

"Band dis-missed!"

"Thank you sir-or-MA'AAAAAAM!"

Kyouka relaxed and let herself smile as the crowd began to disperse. She hopped off the bench and started for the bleachers with the rest of the band, but then someone called her name.

"Hey, Jirou!"

She automatically turned around despite not recognizing the voice and saw the blond-headed, trombone-playing first year Kaminari Denki practically barrelling towards her. She braced herself for impact— teenage boys weren't exactly the most gentle greeters— but fortunately, he skidded to a stop just before they collided.

He swung his instrument around in a way that honestly would have made Kyouka nervous had it not already been one of their trashier school instruments. "Hey, Jirou," he repeated, finishing his fidgeting and finally cradling his trombone properly.

"…Yes?" Kyouka asked, keenly aware of every passing second and the looming sense of urgency rapidly approaching with the next school bell.

"Do you want to, uh, go to homecoming with me?" He asked, finger-gunning her whilst flashing her the cheesiest, most _awkward_ attempt at one of those pretty-boy grins she'd ever seen.

_Seriously?_ She wasn't sure if she should be flattered or weirded out. On one hand, this was a first, being asked to a dance. On the other hand, this was the first time she could remember really talking to this guy.

"Um, I'm flattered," she said, "I really am. But, um—" she glanced at his face and really began to feel bad upon seeing his hopes rise. "But, uh, I'll need some time to think about it."

Kaminari's face fell just a little, but he (thankfully) took it in stride. "Yeah, don't worry about it! I know this is sudden, so really, don't worry about it!"

He finger-gunned her again before running off, and _aw, crap,_ now she should have just said no.

She picked up her backpack and slung it over her shoulder. Now alone on the bleachers, she watched him go until the warning bell rang.

* * *

"It was just so _random,_ Yaomomo!" Kyouka cried, ignoring her lunch in favor of venting. "Like, did _you_ ever get asked stuff like that before getting with Todoroki? No! Because that's _weird!"_

Momo put her chopsticks down and finished chewing before she spoke, as a proper lady does. "It's not weird to ask someone to a dance, Kyouka. But I will admit you're right; it is rather odd to be asking someone you hardly know. Even in bizarre, random circumstances, I would presume that you'd at least share a class, if the offer were at all legitimate."

Instead of responding, Kyouka simply banged her forehead against the keys of their practice room's piano. "Ughhhhh," she groaned above the discordant note. "This is so weiiiird."

Outside, a muffled trumpet briefly hit a sour note, and Kyouka noticed her friend wince.

"Kyo, you know I hate to ask you to repress your emotional responses, but it would be nice if you could refrain from banging on the piano like that. Shoto's practicing outside, you know."

"Don't know why he needs it so badly if he's such a god amongst trumpets," Kyouka huffed.

Momo conveniently ignored that. "Why don't you get started on your lunch? Maybe you'll feel a little better after you eat."

"What if I wanna practice?" Kyouka sat up and eyed Momo with that kind of mock-disdain you only give your best friends when you're feeling both extremely sarcastic and extremely sulky.

"Then you would have brought your sax in with us."

"What if—" she began, but abruptly stopped when her best friend sighed and dropped a dumpling into her bare hands. "Oh. Okay," she said, and stuffed the food into her mouth.

"Better?" Momo asked.

"Yeah. I guess," Kyouka mumbled, trying not to be too gross with her chewing.

"Good," Momo hummed.

Kyouka swallowed, wiped her hands off on a napkin, and dug around in her backpack for her own lunch. Still, she popped a sigh. "I just kind of wish I knew what the hell is up with him, you know?"

"You could ask, you know," Momo reminded her.

Kyouka made a face. "I would prefer not to, thanks."

"You're literally creating your own miscommunication."

"Yeah, maybe I am, but like!" Kyouka flailed for a moment. "It would be just so awkward! Like, just watch me saunter up to him all like, 'hey, so, uh, about that homecoming thing, yeah, so like this _probably_ won't affect my answer but like, what the _fresh hell_ was your last brain cell on when you decided to ask me?'"

"I mean, if you really want to manufacture your own drama, there's nothing I can do to stop you, but honestly, Kyouka, calm down. If you're not going to ask, then you're just going to have to accept the fact that you don't know what he's planning. Besides," Momo said, pausing for a moment to eat another dumpling. "Maybe he knows something you don't."

Kyouka rolled her eyes. "_Maybe."_

.  
.

(Momo conveniently ignored that.)

* * *

_**Author's Note ii.** __at some point, you just have to settle for "good enough." this is my "good enough." I've never actually written a fic where I updated on the fly from the start, hence why this is updating like a month or two after the initial posting lmao._

_"sir-or-MA'AAAAM" comes from one of our sister schools, though it sounds more like "sir-MA'AAAAAM!" technically, you'd call your dm sir regardless of gender but idk I guess I'm just a little enamored with it bc literally all the dms I've been under have been guys._

_Our school apparently used to do this thing where each dance court candidate had to be backed by a club, and since band counted as a club, they were allowed exactly one nomination._

_anyway that's about it. i know no one really expected this to update so like. surprise. interestingly enough this feels like a pretty ambitious project. thank you so much for reading and waiting, feel free to follow/fave if you're new and Feeling It, review if that's what you're into, and as always, have a greaaaaat daaaaaayyy~~~_

* * *

**Next chronologically: **_Chapter 4_


	3. Summer Sun

**Previous Chronologically: **Chapter 1

* * *

**Word Count: **2,841

* * *

But my, what a predicament he still had on his hands! Of course, he _could _be jumping to conclusions, as Miss Jirou had been so kind to point out with her earlier interrogation, but it was _fun_ to _imagine, _okay?

(Sheesh, he sure had an annoying inner voice, trying to burst his bubble all the time.)

"Anyway, I think you can take care of yourself now," Jirou said, effectively bursting his bubble anyway as she checked her phone and stood up. "Break time's about over, but you should probably hang back for a couple more minutes, just in case."

…It would be kind of weird to just spring a soulmate reveal on her after talking for, what, five minutes? Considering some of the horror stories he'd seen on the internet of people springing their reveal on strangers they'd just met (or worse, with pranks that bordered on harassment), it would _definitely _be much too much. Plus, having once had the misfortune of witnessing someone thirst-lie about being soulmates here at school, he didn't want to be _that guy. _(There was a _reason_ he woke up one morning and decided to drop that friend, after all.)

Denki perked up watching her go, though. _Besides,_ he thought, _where's the fun in just telling her?_

He pulled up his other knee, focused entirely on his presumed-soulmate as she walked across the parking lot, that wisp of a sigh back on his breath along with the ghost of a smile.

* * *

Things that made Kaminari Denki sad included the fact that their small groups did _not_ change for every day of band camp and he was stuck with Itsuka across the parking lot from Jirou for the next two weeks, more or less.

Things that made Kaminari Denki a little less sad included lunch breaks, water breaks, bonding breaks, and icebreaker tournament breaks.

And then things that nullified those slightly-un-sad moments?

Standing.

Standing in the _hot summer sun._

Standing in the hot summer sun, _unable to move a muscle except to blink or breathe for upwards of twenty minutes._

Add in about forty or so other thirteen to seventeen-year-olds also standing stock still in a block also in the hot summer sun also unable to move for twenty minutes; two drum majors, a band president, and a handful of alumni intent on making just one of said forty (or so) teenagers laugh or smile or _anything that is not blinking or breathing;_ and it is, objectively speaking, a _terrible _idea.

Give or take a screw-up or two that makes the twenty minutes stretch on into what is much closer to eternity than is really humane, and you get Death Block, a staple of UA band camps.

It's _exactly _as terrible as it sounded.

And it's _exactly_ what Denki would be stuck in if he didn't win whatever icebreaker game that was planned for the afternoon. (Or he could win drilldown too, but c'mon up against monsters like that Iida guy? If there was anything he had learned in the last three days, it was that Iida was like a dang _machine;_ there was _no way_ Denki was winning a drilldown when he was up against a guy like _that.) _

So, that's where he was now, shifting in anticipation as his small group settled into a circle.

Kendou, his group leader, clapped her hands twice to get everyone's attention. "So, we were going to play this game called Thumpers—"

"The _drinking_ game?" some kid called out, but Kendou sent them a funny look.

"What? No— there's a _drinking game_ called Thumpers?" she asked.

"Nevermind!" the kid said, and Kendou returned to her talk, though not without shaking her head a bit beforehand.

"Anyway, we were going to play this game called Thumpers, where you pick a move and a catchphrase and pass it around the circle, but we got a tip-off from an alumnus that admin's been prowling campus lately, so considering one of the moves that made it to finals last year was someone shouting—" a train from the nearby railroad suddenly let off its whistle, and Denki couldn't quite catch what Kendou was saying— "Kyouka and I have made the executive decision to save Mr. Aizawa the paperwork of us getting caught and call this one off," she said.

"Wow, you guys really said screw Bakugou's rights as assistant drum major," someone commented.

(Denki now found himself rather wishing he had paid more attention to people's names. He hadn't been gambling on most of his friends either somehow being too busy for band camp this summer or being in a different small group from him.)

"Well, what's he going to do? Go against a two-thirds majority?" snipped Kendou. "Anyway, you guys have three guesses as to what we're going to do next."

"CANCEL DEATH BLOCK!" shouted Denki without thinking at all.

Kendou snorted and crossed her arms, but still held up two fingers in a peace sign. "Two guesses now."

Almost reflexively, Denki swore out loud.

Kendou gave him a raised-eyebrow look and without saying a word, put down another finger.

"Wrong finger, Kendou!" someone joked.

"Oh, is that right?" she asked, turning around to address them.

(She may or may not have uncrossed her arms to flip them off with her free hand for half a second.)

"One more shot," she said to the group, this time putting her free hand on her hip.

Denki opened his mouth. He definitely _noticed_ everyone turn to stare at him, and because of that, whatever actual idea he had flew right out of his mind from the pressure, and what he _actually _said was:

"_Shit."_

* * *

_("Hey, Kyouka, my whole group's getting Death Block!")_

_("That certainly was fast.")_

* * *

Somehow, Denki survived all that. (Somehow, he survived several more days of that.) And now it was a different day, after a bunch of different games, and now it was time for one last icebreaker game before the student-run band camp came to an end and Mr. Aizawa took over.

"All right, guys, bring it in!" Jirou called from across the parking lot. "All of you! Even Kendou and Bakugou's groups!"

Denki did not need a second prompting. Without missing a beat, he zipped across the blacktop to meet with Kirishima before together, they gathered with everyone else beneath the trees by the band room.

The three heads stood (more or less) together in the center of the small crowd of teenagers all trying to fit under the shade of one tree.

"Oh, uh, you guys can sit down if you want," Jirou added, suddenly looking a little awkward.

Everyone settled down on the grass. (Immediately, Denki and Kirishima began picking at the grass and dead leaves.)

"Okay, so we're gonna play one last game before we let you out for lunch today. No Death Block, just this one last game," announced Kendou.

Denki stopped picking at the grass as Kirishima dropped all his dead leaves, and they high-fived in the midst of everyone cheering.

"We're gonna play a game called Hot Seat, so whoever's in the hot seat has to answer everyone's questions honestly until their time is up," Kendou continued. "There's only three of us this year, so that's about ten minutes for each of us, unless someone else wants to be grilled."

All the band members who had been in band the year before all looked directly at a person whom Denki didn't recognize, a senior girl who always looked like there were stars in her eyes. (Meanwhile, Kirishima elbowed him, and he made an exaggeratedly displeased look in turn.)

"Oh, Fuwa-senpai, you don't have to do it if you don't want to," Jirou said, but the unknown girl, apparently Fuwa-senpai, just brushed her bangs out of her eyes and smiled.

"It's all right; if it's what the people want, then I'll do it."

Denki was not sure if he was both Jirou and Kendou flinch slightly upon hearing that, but the eruption of cheers from the old members meant he didn't have time to think about it, and either way, it probably hadn't been anything, right?

"Anyone else?" Jirou offered, but no one came forward. "All right, five minutes for each of us then. We can let you guys out for lunch a little early today. As a treat."

Another senior whose name he didn't know pulled out their phone as the four teenagers in the center of the crowd played rock, paper, scissors to determine who would be in the hot seat first.

"Just remember, guys, _anything_ goes~!" some random voice called out from within the crowd.

"They're not wrong," sighed Jirou as the other three cleared out.

"Your time starts now."

* * *

"What's it like running band camp without head drum major Togata around?"

Now Denki noticed Jirou wince for sure, but the thing now was that he had no context for what was being asked.

"Oi, Kirishima," he whispered, leaning over. "Who's Togata?"

"He was head drum major when we were freshmen and sophomores."

"Oh, but then what—"

"I mean, it's fine, I guess," Jirou said, unaware of the whispered conversation, causing both boys returned their attention to the game at hand. "I did band camp since summer into eighth grade, actually, since my cousin was in band here at the time, and I already knew I wanted to join marching when I entered high school, so this is my… fourth band camp, wow." She laughed (nervously? Awkwardly? Denki didn't know how to read her, but he tried to take in every detail anyway) and leaned back a bit. "So I think I know the ropes pretty well by this point."

"I'll tell you later," Kirishima whispered.

"Gotcha," Denki replied.

* * *

"This is your fourth year of marching band, right? Why'd you even come to band camp every day for the last two weeks if it's just the fundamentals?"

Fuwa(-senpai? Since it was the only thing Denki had heard her be called, it felt strange to leave it off.) brushed her bangs out of her eyes. "Honestly? I'm not sure. I guess it's because I'd gone to band camp every day for after my first year to just hang out with my senpai in council, who were there, y'know, because they had to, that I just never imagined _not_ doing the same summer into my senior year too." She shrugged and flashed a good-natured smile. "Plus it's nice to be really good at the Death Block games."

Denki wasn't exactly the best at reading between the lines, but something seemed up here. He leaned over to ask Kirishima about it, but the latter beat him to it.

"I'll tell you about it later."

* * *

"What's your favorite color?"

Kendou sent a look that Denki could only describe as saying, "how dare you, you horrible little man," to the person asking the question (whom he _recognized_ this time! (It was Monoma, the annoying trumpet player from concert band last year.)) and said, "Leaf litter."

Scattered laughter.

"For those of you who don't get the joke," explained Jirou from somewhere in that crowd, "Itsuka is partially red-green colorblind."

"Yes, it's called deuteranomaly, and the only reason it was even caught in me is because one time, in middle school, I had to wear brown for a concert or something, so I got out my favorite brown button-up shirt, but everyone kept telling me it was green, so eventually my parents became worried about my sanity and got me tested," Kendou said, playing with the ends of her ponytail for a bit before tossing it over he shoulder. "Apparently I'm weak to, like, four shades of green, but it doesn't really affect my life. It's not going to stop me from driving or whatever. Someone ask me a new question now."

* * *

"Yo, Bakugou, where were you in freshman and sophomore year?"

Bakugou turned to scowl in the direction of the question, but he couldn't seem to locate it and just ended up scowling at everyone. "First of all, I _was_ here for the first half of freshman year, and I came _back_ in sophomore year. Second of all, I legally cannot tell you what happened."

_(What in the god damn hell did that mean?)_

"I have no idea what he's talking about," whispered Kiri, so it seemed the context was destined to be forever unknown.

"Aww, c'mon!" someone whined.

Bakugou scanned the crowd and nodded at someone, his eyebrows still furrowed in anger. (Was that Midoriya? Or just someone in that vicinity?) "I _legally_ cannot say, so shut the fuck up on that."

* * *

"…And that's all I know."

"Okay, that makes a lot of sense," Denki said after Kirishima finished explaining the band power struggle drama that seemed to be carrying over from last year. "I guess that means that Jirou's under a lot of stress right now, huh?"

"Dunno," said Kiri. "She seemed to handle it pretty well back in May, but then again, she had Nejire and Tamaki helping out too."

The two of them were in Toyomitsu's, the deli by the school (because frankly, Denki had gotten a little addicted to the sandwich they offered called _the Yakuza _over the course of band camp), practically spouting exposition at each other like it was a bad anime. But, well, it wasn't as if Denki knew what was going on, and Kirishima _had_ been in marching band the previous year, so _it made sense. _

"And she _did_ say she'd been doing this for ages."

Kirishima sat up a little bit straighter and held up a finger to let Denki know that _hey, he had something to say, just give him a second to finish chewing. _

He swallowed, put down his sandwich, and said, "Rose Parade."

Denki stopped for a second, then nodded in slow realization. "You're riiiight, I forgot about that. That's, like, this year, right?"

"Next year," Kirishima corrected. "When we're seniors."

Denki sat back and crossed his arms. "Oh, well, then that's forever from now. She'll have gotten used to it by then."

"I mean— sure, fine, whatever," said Kiri. "Anyway, like, dude, why're you so concerned about Jirou? She's head drum major; all this stuff is just part of her job."

Denki paused from biting into his sandwich and sat back again. "Wait. Did I not tell you?"

"Would I be asking you if you had?"

"Oh, well, I'm pretty sure she's my soulmate."

There was a moment in which Kirishima didn't respond, so Denki returned to his sandwich.

"Okay, so let me get this straight," Kirishima said as Denki happily chewed on one of The _Best _sandwiches he'd had in his life. "Well, actually scratch the straight part, _but anyway, you're_ telling _me_ that _you_ think that _drum major Jirou_ is your soulmate?"

"Yup. She told me a bit about her soulmate experiences on the first day," Denki replied, downing a hefty glob of sandwich right after and providing no other explanation. (He noticed Kiri's dumbfounded squinting, but elected to ignore it in favor of this _bitchin'_ sandwich.)

"You know, bro, I think this is one of the most hairbrained ideas you've ever had, and _Mina's_ been calling _me_ Hairbrain since _middle school,"_ Kirishima deadpanned at him. "_Mina."_

Denki pouted at his bro, somewhat dramatically. "No, I'm _serious._ I really think she's the one. Like, she was _sitting there_ and _watching over me_ after I fainted on the first day! I'm not saying that's a bigger sign than the music thing or anything, but that seems pretty meant to be, don't you think?"

Kirishima very neatly folded his hands on the table and sighed. "You know that I hate to be the rational one here, but my dude. My bro. My _guy. _This is not the first time you've jumped the gun on something like this."

Denki sighed. "Okay. So maybe this isn't my _first_ gun-jumping radio. _But, _now that I'm in marching, I can call priority on the school instruments for outside practice, so we can _test it out_ now," he said, finishing it off with a triumphant note.

Kirishima stared at him for a minute. Denki let him.

At last, exasperated, the former returned to his regular old role as Denki's partner in crime, apparently deciding _if you can't beat 'em, join 'em._ "You know what? Why not. Let's figure something out."

"Later," said Denki, gesturing to his lunch.

"Later," Kirishima agreed.

* * *

**_Author's Note iii. _**_*rolls in on a skateboard with a glass of iced apple juice in my hand and also i'm wearing a pair of sick shades* folks, you guys are NOT gonna believe what fic is coming back to life. THAT'S RIGHT IT'S THIS ONE! ! ! i'm back and i'm better than ever, babey! this is gonna be my new active wip, ideally updating once a week mondays and/or fridays. more details about release schedule will be explained around the time chapter eight or nine comes out. c:_

_the chapter lengths will be all over the place, but having just finished chapter eight the other day, i can say w/fair confidence that the average length will probably be around 2.5k, though there will be chapters under 1k and almost (n probably over) 4k. most should be in the 2k range tho._

_anyway fuwa-senpai is just this one 2-a girl we got to see in ch 254 in the manga. she has her own character arc going on in the background that's not really important to the story going on in here, but i guess you could say it's a subplot._

_anyway, you'll probably notice these wonderful little notices at the start and end of each chapter going "previously/next chronologically." that is to give later readers the option of reading chapters in chronological order rather than publishing order if they prefer. there are... more changes to come with the presentation of this fic as time goes on. let's just say that i have all the chapters planned out from start to finish for a reason. this is going to be a hugely experimental work for me (you might want to notice how i said "work" rather than "fic"), so i'm honestly preparing for this to be unpopular now, but hey! if you're down, welcome aboard. it's gonna be fun._

_i have a lot of Extra Notes over on my tumblr (**a-piece-of-shipping-trash. tumblr. com**) because if i put everything i wanted to add on about in these a/ns, there would be some notes longer than the chapters themselves lol. if you're reading this as the chapters come out, then each extra notes post should be one of the first posts you see when you go on my blog, but if you're coming in late, then just add "**/tagged/Bb-notes**_**_-music-of-the-moment_**_**/chrono**" to the end of the url to get all of the extra notes posts abt moment in posting order. _

_yeah! ! you should *finger guns* leave a review! ! ! ! ! and as always, have a greaaaat daaaayyy~~_

* * *

**Next Chronologically: **Chapter 5


	4. The Sun Always Shines on TV

**Previous Chronologically: **Chapter 2

* * *

**Word Count: **2,330

* * *

Oh, _no. _

What had she _done? _Backed herself into a corner and now she couldn't escape because Homecoming was _next Friday_ now.

Kyouka clutched her sax case to her chest just the way she _never _did normally because this was _not_ her normal at _all, _and tried to avoid eye contact with Kaminari without making it too obvious that she was avoiding eye contact. (He just looked so _hopeful, _and she _knew_ she didn't owe him anything, and she _knew_ she'd just have a terrible time if she said yes, but she _hated _hurting the feelings of people she didn't already know terribly well.)

She was going to have to do it. Just bite the bullet and turn him down.

She sighed and forced herself to relax her arms, to let her sax case fall to her side, to unball her hands from their firsts. "I'm sorry," she said. "But no."

She was looking at her feet, so she _definitely_ noticed Kaminari take a tiny step back. (With his right foot first, but this wasn't the field show, so she simply filed it under pet peeve violations.)

Kaminari laughed, and although she didn't know him all that well, it sounded at least a _little_ forced. "Yeah, don't worry about it. You don't have to explain yourself to me."

He left, and that was that. No fanfare. No show. She gave her answer, and he… took it.

Kyouka let out a sigh of relief and put her sax away. The band room hadn't quite cleared out yet, since there were some people with classes nearby that liked to hang out a bit before they had to leave, but _her_ friends had already scattered. Oh, the suffering that was having to cross the largest high school campuses in the area to get to class on time.

She checked her phone as she slung her backpack over her shoulder, and she paused when she noticed a text from Nejire. She glanced up to make sure she wouldn't walk into any impending poles any time soon, and opened it as she set out for class.

_[Ex-President Bluebelle]: hey!  
[Ex-President Bluebelle]: i'm going to be back this weekend for my birthday bc my parents were too busy to come visit me the other day  
[Ex-President Bluebelle]: wanna visit mirio while i'm here? :3_

Somehow, just hearing from Nejire eased the pressures on Kyouka's mind and allowed her to smile.

_**[Fresh Bby DM of UA]: Sure  
**__**[Fresh Bby DM of UA]: (^∇^*)**_

* * *

As Nejire hopped, skipped, and jumped off to find a hospital floor map, Kyouka sighed and found a pair of empty seats to occupy as she waited. Sure, she _joked_ about how waking up at seven was the Dream because of zero period band, but that only applied to _weekdays. _Waking up at seven on a Saturday was, like, _illegal. _

As Kyouka sat in the mostly-empty hospital foyer, half dissociated and half sleep-deprived, there came a pitter-pattering of footsteps running up from behind her, soon followed by an excited, friendly pat on the head.

Kyouka turned around. "Oh, good morning, Eri," she said to one very excited little seventh grader bouncing around behind her. "Where's your— oh, good morning, Mr. Aizawa."

UA's band director came trudging up behind his daughter, looking exactly as tired as Kyouka felt. "Good morning," he grunted, putting a firm hand on Eri's head in an attempt to keep her from bouncing off the walls. (The operative word there being _attempt.) _"Wasn't expecting to see you here."

Kyouka shifted around in the seat so that she more easily faced the duo. "Nejire brought me over to visit Togata today."

"Oh, is she here too?" asked Mr. Aizawa flatly, as Eri, by contrast, now appeared to be vibrating at a speed just barely visible to the human eye.

(Kyouka had to use all her self-control to keep her usual poker face on and not burst into giggles at the scene.) "She's running around looking for a map, I think."

Mr. Aizawa grunted. Eri wrestled her head out of her dad's grip and climbed over the back of the chair to sit down next to Kyouka.

"Have you been doing okay so far this year?" Mr. Aizawa asked. "You're taking a lot of APs alongside being drum major." His tone was as bland as ever, but he still clearly cared a lot.

"I'm fine," Kyouka automatically replied. Not exactly true, but she'd seen Togata handle more last year, and so she would learn to deal with it on her own in time. (If she accepted help now, she'd just become dependent on it, and that was _not_ her goal.)

Mr. Aizawa seemed to raise an eyebrow about one half millimeter in concern, but didn't say anything.

His daughter, however, appeared not to have acquired his subtlety. Eri frowned and leaned in so close, Kyouka could feel the horn on her little unicorn headband poke into her face. "You said that awful fast," she said.

_As if a twelve-year-old would be able to understand anything going on here, _sulked Kyouka inside her head. "I'm _fine,"_ she repeated. "Besides, it's only three APs. Yaomomo's taking _five."_

Eri sat back down with a huff. Mr. Aizawa's eyebrow seemed to go up by _several _more millimeters.

Nejire chose that exact moment to come bounding back onto the scene. She and Eri did an elaborate secret handshake (one which Kyouka was slightly convinced was made up on the spot, only made possible by their shared, preppy connection) before switching her attention to Mr. Aizawa and bouncing three crates' worth of questions off this tired, not-actually-that-physically-old-but-spiritually-_ancient _man.

"Hey! Hey! Hey, sensei! Hey, Mr. Aizawa! What'cha doin' here today? How's the band? Hey, isn't Homecoming coming up soon? What school are we playing against? Hey, hey, hey, sensei! The trombones aren't slacking off again, are they? What's the field show theme like this year? How's my little Fuwa-Fuwa doing?" she asked, barely breathing between her words, a show made all the more impressive by all her tireless bouncing.

Mr. Aizawa's expression didn't change. "Eri has a routine appointment this morning. Which, we need to be checking in for right now."

Nejire finally took a step back. "Aww, okay."

Eri loudly groaned and fell dramatically backward, as if the waiting bench were a fainting couch. Mr. Aizawa ignored her theatrics and began shuffling away. "We don't have all morning, Eri."

Pouting, Eri slid off the bench, waved goodbye to the two older girls, and ran to catch up to her father. Kyouka watched as she latched herself onto Mr. Aizawa's arm and suddenly missed being twelve years old herself.

Then, something warm worked its way over to her arm, and Kyouka looked up to see that Nejire had linked their elbows together with a smile.

"Ready to go?" she asked.

Some of that painful, empty longing for a time gone by left Kyouka's chest, and she did her best to smile. "Yeah," she said.

Nejire took off skipping, pulling Kyo along for the ride via arm link. Kyouka stumbled a bit at first, but she fell in step as easily as a fish swam in water until they stopped in the elevator. Nejire still kept their arms linked together (just for the fun of it, Kyouka presumed), and she pulled out her phone.

"So last time he was here, Tamaki said that Mirio had gone into a 'minimally conscious state', and so he might be able to answer some questions, if we're lucky, but he also mentioned that we should be wary of his responses because y'know, not exactly all there again yet. Still, it's such a relief to know that the coma's not gonna be forever, and that he'll keep on getting better," said Nejire, showing Kyouka snippets of her text conversation with the aforementioned Tamaki.

"Yeah, that's good," Kyouka replied, still altogether unsure of what to say or do or feel about all this. She hadn't visited Togata since the start of September at least, before her band senpai had gone off to college and all eyes suddenly seemed to be on her and her alone.

"Three, two, one," chirped Nejire, and right on time, the elevator doors slid open. The two girls skipped down the hall, arm in arm, laughing and smiling until they got to the room labelled _Mirio Togata._

At long last, Nejire unlinked their arms, and with her new free hand, knocked on the door. "Visitors~!" she sang, and a nurse opened the door, smiling politely at them. "Good morning, Bubbles!"

"Good morning, Nejire," said the nurse, whose name tag read _Kaoruko. _"Just finished with the morning exercises. I'm afraid there's still no voluntary movement below the waist, though."

Nejire nodded seriously while Kyouka stood there feeling like the awkward little kid taken along on an errand because there was no available babysitter. The privacy curtain around Togata's hospital bed was mostly closed, but Kyouka tried her best to avoid looking at it. _(Oh, what lovely shoes I have on today. Would it maybe be okay if I sat on that window bench there? Did I finish practicing my kanji for the week?)_

"…Well, I'd best be finishing my rounds," said Nurse Kaoruko as she stretched. "Take care, girls."

Nejire laughed a little and said, "Have fun with that, Bubbles!"

Kyouka heard the nurse snort as she closed the door behind her, and as soon as she was gone, she felt that tense awkwardness dissipate. Kyouka relaxed into a slouch and sat down on the window bench she'd been previously eyeing as Nejire practically danced her way over to the bed.

"Good morning, Mi~ri~o~" she chirped. "I'm gonna open the privacy curtain now, okay?"

There was a mumbled reply of, "_okay," _and strangely, Kyouka felt taken aback. She hadn't heard Togata speak in months. His progress was real and tangible; he was coming out the other end of an intense rough patch.

"_Whoosh!"_ said Nejire as she _whoosh_ed the curtain open.

Kyouka looked at Togata, and he smiled at her in recognition. Well, if there was one thing about this movie-quality drama that seemed to be her life that _wasn't _following the books, it was that her mentor figure _didn't_ have amnesia. (Still, she was hesitant to say anything about band, lest he be disappointed in her struggles as his inadequate replacement.)

"C'mon, Kyouka, c'mere and tell us about how the band is doing! Mr. Aizawa never answered anything for meeee," said Nejire.

Togata nodded along, but he seemed tired and almost a bit hollow. It was a jarring feeling, but Kyouka ignored her distress because she knew it came from expectations misaligned with reality. She put on a smile (nervous that she was faking it), sat down next to Nejire, and began to tell them the stories they had missed.

* * *

Usually, there was a seemingly endless playlist of bubblegum pop playing when riding in Nejire's car, but today, Kyouka had asked her to shut off the car music. Her soulmate was listening to what seemed to be a compilation playlist of all the Pokémon theme songs ever released, and the more recent ones didn't exactly jive well with Hannah Montana. Still, that didn't stop Nejire from humming to herself and tapping on the steering wheel as she drove them to Dragon's Breath for some post-hospital-visit cake and boba.

Kyouka had to admit, watching the buildings go by to the upbeat synth tunes of Pokémon was pretty fun. Sure, it was a little loud up in her skull, but it wasn't _her_ ears that were going to suffer from it, so it was whatever.

As Nejire took a left, Kyouka found herself suddenly wondering about a little detail she'd overlooked in the hospital room.

"Hey, Nejire, how come the nurse just told you about Togata's medical progress? Isn't that considered confidential information?"

"Togata's parents signed a release form because Tamaki and I found and translated his living will for them," Nejire casually replied, pulling into the parking lot of the Dragon's Breath bakery.

"Living will?" asked Kyouka as they unbuckled their seatbelts.

"It's that thing that says what you want to happen to you if you get put into a coma and you don't come out as fast as usual. Miri, Tama, and I made some for ourselves when we were juniors when Tamaki's anxiety got bad one time. We made sure to mention in all of ours we wanted the others to receive updates about our conditions." Nejire got out of the car and waited for Kyouka to meet her on the other side, at which point she gave the younger girl a look of concern that mirrored that of Mr. Aizawa's hours earlier. "Hey, Kyouka. Are you okay?"

Kyouka gave the ex-band president a displeased look. "Yeah, of course I am."

Nejire hummed with a mixture of disapproval and disbelief. "You seem a little different today. Everything's going all right in band, right?"

"I'd have told you if there was trouble."

Nejire raised an eyebrow, humming again. "Mm, well, the sun always shines on TV, but I trust you, Kyouka," she said.

This was fine. Everything was going to be fine. Kyouka believed in herself just fine. She was gonna be the very best like no one ever was, and this entire year was going to be fine. She just had to work for it.

* * *

**_Author's Note iv. _**_has it really only been a week since i updated this? it feels like it's been at LEAST a month o-o'. anyway yay here we (finally) find out what happened with mirio such that kyouka can't rely on him the way she needs to be able to. and also meet eri. i love eri. and dadzawa. eri is actually a minor recurring character, though i can't say for certain how much you'll be seeing of her bc she doesn't impact the plot in any way. she just shows up and hangs out at band events bc her dad's the band director. she's actually in seventh grade here bc if you read the Bb oneshots, she appears as an incoming freshman when the 1-a kids have just graduated. _

_you're gonna see a LOT of kyouka insisting that she's fine when she very clearly is not in this fic. it's part of her being stubborn and refusing to communicate. honestly, i tend to characterize jirou as being very stubborn, but this au is probably peak stubborn jirou for me. literally all her problems could be solved if she would just stop being stubborn, talk about things, and get some gosh darn help. part of this is bc she's already supremely stressed out by being head dm with big shoes to fill, so the idea of trying to solve her other, more minor problems, stresses her out more and so she doesn't want to think about them lest she acknowledge how Not Okay she really is and have a breakdown._

_i love high school __ᕕ( ᐛ )ᕗ_

_anyway the mirio thing is mostly just a minor subplot w/o a lot of detail bc it's the one aspect of this fic that has nothing drawn from my real life. i don't know jack diddly squat about what life is like for someone coming out of a coma, and i've done research, but i don't trust myself to make up details. _

_as always (for this fic anyway), there are extra notes up on my tumblr **a-piece-of-shipping-trash **tagged under "**Bb notes: music of the moment**" *train whistle* up next, kaminari and kirishima try to figure out if jirou is for sure kaminari's soulmate! do your thing, leave a review maybe, and as always, have a greaaaat daaaaayyy~~~_

* * *

**Next Chronologically: **Chapter 7


	5. Wouldn't It Be Nice

**Previous Chronologically: **chapter 3

* * *

**Word Count: **2,424

* * *

"All right," announced Denki to his grand audience of exactly one other person. "Lunch period one of junior year, and Sero's already got MESA meetings to attend, and Mina's already got choreo practices to organize. Looks like it's just you and me here in this here practice room, buddy. You, me, and our baribones."

Kirishima struggled to hold his baritone case on his lap without also taking his backpack off the chair. "Did Mr. Aizawa say that we could take these out to practice during lunch already?" he asked, a perfectly reasonable question because Mr. Aizawa was notoriously picky when it came to instrument care.

A perfectly reasonable question to which Denki shrugged and simply said, "Dunno," with a smile. He tapped on his trombone case, thinking, but somehow without having any thoughts at all.

Kirishima looked at a corner in the ceiling like it was an imaginary camera and he was on _The Office. _Then, with a sigh, he slid his case off his lap and replaced it with his backpack, rooting through it for his ratty music folder. "Well, we might as well start working on our field show music then."

Denki snapped out of his half-trance, half-daydream. "Wait! We still need to do the thing!"

Kirishima pulled out his music folder and dropped his backpack to the ground before giving Denki a puzzled look. "The thing?"

Denki leaned on his trombone case with his elbow because he was dumb and thought it made him look cool (even though there really was no point to trying to impress Kirishima). "The soulmate thing. Y'know, where we try to prove that drum major Jirou is my soulmate."

"Right," said Kirishima, sitting back and crossing his legs. He began thumbing through his folder, which was still full of all the songs from the year prior. He paused. "How are we gonna do that?"

Denki deflated. "I have no idea."

* * *

Fortunately, a few days later, Mina was free enough to spend a lunch period in the practice room with the two boys.

"All right, lads," she said, squeezing into the room. "What's the big, secret thing that can't be talked about in precalc _or _the Discord?"

"Shut the door first!" hissed Denki, to which Mina rolled her eyes but ultimately obeyed.

"I hope you realize that our neighbors can hear our muffled conversation if we're loud enough," she grumbled.

"Yeah, _muffled! _That doesn't mean they can _understand_ us!"

Mina crossed her arms and sat on the floor in front of the door, for the boys were taking up both of the available chairs. "Yeah, yeah, whatever. This better be good if Hanta can't know about it."

"More like trying to pencil in Sero's availability would have us sitting on this until winter break," grumbled Kirishima.

"Yeah, he can know, he's just busy all the time," said Denki, but Mina didn't seem to care too much.

"Dude, just _spill!_ We don't have all lunch period! I spent way too much time in line getting this shitty lunch to have you waffle around like this!"

"Okay, okay, okay, okay," said Denki, his voice a little shrill from irritation. "Anyway, so. I think that drum major Jirou is my soulmate, and—"

A half-eaten baby carrot dipped in ranch fell out of Mina's open mouth and landed back in the ranch pool.

Denki tried to pretend he didn't recognize the ravenous, shippy gleam in her eyes as he continued. "—_aaand_ I need some way to confirm without just going up to her and asking because I don't want to freak her out or be too weird."

Mina grimaced, likely at the memory of a certain little, grape-obsessed, smudge of toilet scum Denki had (most regrettably) been friends with in their freshman year. "Okay, yeah, that's a good idea," she said. She shoved a few more carrots into her mouth, presumably to get the foul taste of an even fouler memory from her mind. "What have you got in mind, Chargebolt?"

Denki and Kirishima exchanged sheepish glances.

"That's the thing," began Denki, slowly, such as to put off the inevitable confession.

"He's got _nothin',"_ finished Kirishima, putting a hand over his heart and pretending to shed a tear, as if fondly remembering someone deceased.

Mina said nothing for a bit, allowing the boys' words to sink in for a few seconds.

"Quick question, guys," she said after swallowing her carrots. "How long have you been thinking this?"

Denki and Kirishima exchanged loaded glances again.

"Since, like, day one of band camp," said Denki, speaking with a _fantastic _degree of confidence for someone who was currently feeling awkward, embarrassed, sheepish, and terrified all at once.

"_Bruh!"_ cried Mina, motioning towards him with both hands for emphasis. "That was like, mid-July! That was a _month_ ago! How have you _not_ come up with anything in a _month?!"_

"It was _summer!"_ argued Denki. "All my brain cells are on vacation to Belize or something starting three days before school ends every year!"

"And we've been _back in school_ for a few days now!"

"The plane back home's been delayed, okay?! Besides, it's not like you've got a whole lot of your own to spare! All _you _ever think about is _romance!"_

"Exactly why you should have messaged the Discord about it at some point! We have #mina-the-love-master for a _reason!"_

"_Ladies,_ ladies, please stop fighting," said Kirishima, stepping in at last. "You're _both _pretty."

Denki and Mina glared twin sets of daggers at the baritone player, who grinned as non-threateningly as he could and put both his hands in the air. (A trombone player, he could take, no sweat. But a _percussionist?_ He did _not _like his odds.)

The tension in the air slowly relaxed, and Kirishima was able to lower his hands again, folding them on his lap.

"Mina," he said, his tone so grave it almost sounded threatening. "We all know that you submit accounts of our stupid shenanigans to the school secrets page."

"I black out our icons and names and stuff," huffed Mina, crossing her arms. "Besides, you guys said I could."

"Yes, which is exactly why Denki told me that all discussions of the Soulmate Jirou WIP had to happen in real life," he continued, to which Denki furiously nodded before pausing from the sudden dawning of a realization.

"Wait. Did we make the initials there 'SJW' on purpose?" he asked.

"Dunno," Kirishima immediately replied.

Mina sighed. "All right, fine, fine. Cross my heart and hope to die I won't tell anyone about this until pigs can fly."

"Pinky promise?" Denki asked, sticking out his pinky.

Mina grabbed onto his pinky with her own, and Kirishima whistled. "No going back on that now, _Pinky,"_ he said.

"Shut up. You had a _My Little Pony_ phase too."

Kirishima shut up.

"Anyway, what were we talking about?" asked Denki to the air. Two seconds passed before he snapped, remembering. "Right. Mina. We are in desperate need of your folksy advice: how do I confirm that drum major Jirou is my soulmate without asking or being weird or obvious or whatever?"

Mina put down her crappy school chicken sandwich and squinted at Denki, stroking an imaginary beard for a few moments. "Have you considered using your instrument?" she asked.

"…To an extent."

"Then why not just play the field show music in the practice room and have Eijirou hang out outside to see if she has any reaction to it?"

"Well, you see, she already told me that she has suspicions that her soulmate's in our band, so that's not actually going to confirm anything," explained Denki.

"Besides, aren't there always a couple people working on field show stuff in and out of the band room during lunch?" Kirishima pointed out. "I don't think she's gonna bat an eye, man."

Mina furrowed her brow and deepened her thinking frown. "Well, if that's not gonna cut it, we're just gonna have to go for a different song."

"Liiiiike…?" Denki prompted, gesturing for her to elaborate.

"Hmmm…" hummed Mina, and it went on for several agonizing minutes. Then suddenly, her eyes lit up. "Aha!" she said. "Something like—"

* * *

It was now the middle of September. For the last few weeks, Denki had practiced _Careless Whisper_ on his trombone with the best mute his broke ass could buy. (Which, when combined with Kirishima's considerably _less _broke ass, was actually not that bad.)

"Ahh-hiyaaa, dancin' in September, ahh-haaa yeah, I don't know the wo-ords!" sang Denki to himself, trying to calm himself down as he approached Mr. Aizawa at the start of one particular lunch period. From a chair up by one of the pianos, Mina shot him a thumbs-up, so, feeling a little emboldened, he crept up to the band director, cradling his trombone properly for once such as to convey his sincerity.

"Do you need something," asked Mr. Aizawa, spotting him first with those gosh darn _eagle eyes_ of his.

"Oh, uh, yes, sir. I'd like to ask you a question," said Denki, feeling more than a little bit like a deer caught in headlights.

Mr. Aizawa grunted and began shuffling through a mountain of papers on his desk. "Well, chop-chop, kiddo. I have band council to run soon."

Denki's palms began to sweat. He adjusted his grip on his instrument in an attempt to keep it safer, but only really seemed to succeed in making it sweatier. _Gross. _"Uh, can I borrow a practice room to work on stuff for today?"

Mr. Aizawa shifted his sharp eyes over to give him a lazy, but judgemental glare. "Oh, yes. You're behind on the music, aren't you? The trombones always were so lazy with training their new members." He sighed, realigned a stack of papers, and stood up.

Denki gulped, as the director was quite a tall guy. Having a tall, scraggly, hobo-looking man stare down at you was quite stressful, as I'm sure you can imagine.

"Do you have a mute?" Mr. Aizawa asked flatly.

"Yes, sir," replied Denki, showing the director his moderately crappy mute.

"Good, good," said Mr. Aizawa, beginning to leave. Denki quickly walked backwards, terrified of the man when he was on the move. "Now, shoo. I can't have any of the concert band kids knowing that I'm letting you practice during band council."

Denki fled to the practice room farthest to the back, where Kirishima was waiting for him inside.

"Did you get permission this time?" asked the latter as he shut the door.

Denki nodded. "Everything according to keikaku," he said aloud.

"Translator's note, '_keikaku'_ means plan," Kirishima absently replied.

"_Thank_ you, Mr. '_I'm taking Spanish because my moms are from Vietnam and I don't need to learn Japanese to communicate coherently with them',"_ Denki snipped.

"Dude, it is _not_ my fault that AP Japanese is at the same time as AP Physics," Kirishima said, exasperated. "Anyway, I'm getting one bar of reception in here somehow, so I told Mina to text us if she notices Jirou acting funny during council."

"Can you ask the 8 ball something for me, actually?"

"What is it?" Kirishima asked, thumbs hovering over his phone keyboard.

"'_n!8ball is this a dumb idea?'_"

"'_Reply hazy, try again later'_," Kiri read aloud, after he received transmission from the server's noble 8 ball bot. He shut off his phone and looked at Denki. "You know what that means. You gotta start playing now and ask again later, _after_ it becomes a little clearer whether or not this is gonna go up in spectacular flames or not."

Denki wiped the sweat off his palms and onto his pants. "Yeah, I guess you're right," he said.

He mounted the trombone on his shoulder, facing away from the door. He took in a deep breath, then let it out again because that was just to calm his nerves. Then, it was simple.

_Three, two, __breathe__, play._

* * *

Jirou stopped him soon after he was out the door.

"Hey," she said, voice a tad stern. "Next time you practice in here when there's band council going on, try to use a mute. I could hear you from all the way up front. No one else seemed to care about it, so I'm going to let you go this time, but next time, could you _please_ at least work on something related to the field show? Don't think I wouldn't recognize _Careless Whisper_ within three seconds, man."

Oh, _hell_ yeah. Hell _to _the yeah!

Denki grinned at her and flicked his head up in acknowledgement. "Oh, yeah, sure. Of course. Next time, next time," he said.

"That's good," said Jirou, giving him a firm pat on the shoulder, not unlike the way Mr. Aizawa did it. "Put your heart into it, and we'll look stellar."

Denki watched her walk away, absolutely _giddy._

Kirishima finally popped out of the band room with Mina in tow. "Yo, what was that?" he asked.

Denki didn't say anything. He simply held out his hand for a high five.

"_**FUCK**_ yeah!" shouted Mina, immediately slapping his hand so hard it stung.

"_Language,"_ chided Mr. Aizawa from inside the band room, though it was muffled by his sleeping bag. (Just how quickly could that man zip himself up like that?)

"Dude," said Kirishima, giving him a less aggressive, but much more satisfying high five, "you are braver than any U.S. Marine. This is gonna be _so_ cool."

"Now to just figure out how to tell her," added Mina.

Whereas previously, the boys would have froze at the thought of more planning to do, Denki was at least running on a confidence high, and that high was rubbing off on Kirishima. They looked at each other, nodded, and then faced Mina.

"I think we can handle this one ourselves," Denki said.

"Yeah," agreed Kirishima, and they both nodded reassuringly.

Mina looked like she was about to say something, but Mr. Aizawa hopped out of the band room.

"What are you kids still doing here?" he demanded. "You have three minutes to get to your next class. Scram!"

The trio swore and sprinted off to their next classes.

* * *

**_Author's Note v. _**_this is the first chapter where any not-bakugou character is allowed to say fuck, and it's honestly all downhill from here lol. bakugou will be showing up as a recurring character later, and like. this is high school. **i** started saying fuck and shit in high school. also sometimes there's just never anything quite as good as "fuck yeah" or "holy fuck" so like What Can Ya Do. _

_some fun things mentioned in this chapter that are mostly just trivia include kirishima being raised by viet lesbians, mina being on a dance team, the both of them having a mlp phase at some point in their past, and kaminari lowkey making careless whisper his signature song. more trivia and stuff abt this au is on my tumblr (on which i am **a-piece-of-shipping-trash**), tagged under _"hua's vanity"

_next chapter covers their homecoming game/rally, and it's a bit of a doozy length-wise hehehe. anyway yeah, thanks for reading, leave a review, and as always, have a greaaaat daaaaayyyy~~~_

* * *

**Next Chronologically: **chapter 2


	6. Queen of the Night

_**Previous Chronologically: **Chapter 7_

* * *

**Word Count: **4,277

* * *

Kyouka played with the crumb rubber and fake turf on their school's football field. (Why they had such a nice field when their football team sucked so bad, she would never understand, but who was she to complain? It made running field shows that much easier.) She couldn't hear _anything_ the announcer was saying about anything, since no one ever thought to direct an amp at the poor ol' _performers_ hanging out on the field during the rally. How the dance teams managed to actually dance when they could hardly hear their music was _beyond_ her, and frankly? Nothing but respect for _those_ peeps.

She tried to air out her shirt a bit; despite being the middle of October, the _California weather_ had, for whatever reason, decided to be in those bitchy high nineties. Eventually, though, she resigned to living with the trickle of sweat going down her back and vowed to help uniform managers Mina and Tooru bleach out the stains later.

The band always went first at rallies, and the Homecoming rally was no exception. All there really was to do now was hang out on their designated corner of the field, watch the other performers, curse admin or whoever up top decided that the performers would sit out on the field rather than up in the stands with the rest of the school, and _completely _miss everything that was being announced about the dance court.

In the background, she could hear some people snickering and, if she listened carefully enough, throwing crumb rubber at one another. Was this really it? Was this really the band she'd cultivated?

She turned around and made eye contact with Kaminari, who, as it turned out, had been among the ones flinging around crumb rubber.

He smiled at her, all bright and cheerful, as if he were just having some harmless fun with friends.

She sent him a withering glare.

He made a sad puppy dog face, but stopped anyway.

Kyouka sighed, pissed.

"Yeah, Sparky's a real piece o'shit."

Kyouka turned to look at her fellow drum major, who was idly picking at the dirt under his nails. "You know him?" she asked.

Bakugou spent a moment studying the tiny glob of dirt he'd freed before flicking it away. "He's in our grade. Why the fuck wouldn't I?"

"I meant on like a personal level."

Bakugou looked up from his preening to give her a judgemental glare. "Are you saying you _don't_ get to know all the members of your own band?"

Kyouka hit the turf out of frustration. "Dude, there's like eighty-something people, and it's, like, three months into the school year!" _Plus, it's your band, too. _

"That's fair." Bakugou resumed his nail care. "Anyway, he's begging me for help in physics. Fucking nitwit." He threw a little crumb of dirt with far more force than necessary.

"Uhuh. Glad _I_ don't have any classes with him. And are you helping him?"

"Well, duh. I'm not a fucking asshole."

Kyouka raised an eyebrow at him. "Are you sure about that?"

Bakugou looked up at the bright, cloudless sky and let out a loud, angry sigh. "I'm not _that_ much of an asshole."

"Okay, hoe."

Bakugou elbowed her hard enough that she definitely felt it, but not so hard that it would hurt or leave a mark for too long. "Shut the fuck up." He looked back down and muttered angrily to himself for a bit. "Anyway, where are you guys in the book for AP Japanese? I need to know how fucking far behind you guys are compared to me."

Kyouka struggled to hold in an angry sigh of her own (because _ugh, _Bakugou being smug about his self-studying), but without its catharsis, she simply felt more frustrated (because again, _ugh, _smug Bakugou). "I don't know the lesson number off the top of my head. I'll tell you later."

Bakugou merely grunted in response.

* * *

Kyouka loved band. She loved the songs, she loved the field show, she loved the community. There was never any question as to her love for the band.

But if there was anything she hated about any part of band, it was when football games started before sundown, and she (along with the rest of the band) was waiting in the stands for pregame to start with the blazing, setting sun shooting straight-up _searing _beams of light into her eyeballs, effectively blinding her.

Homecoming had a half-hour long pregame show where everyone performed the same routines they'd shown off at the rally earlier in the week, just this time to the three-to-seven sets of parents who came early enough to watch. This meant that for this night, and this _last_ night only, Kyouka had to suffer once more through the blinding, setting sun shooting straight-up _searing_ beams of light into her eyeballs one Friday night longer than if the school had decided to have Homecoming be _next_ football game instead.

She shielded her eyes best she could as she watched the timer go down on the score billboard. It was not helping that said billboard was in the same general direction as the aforementioned setting sun.

Someone crashed into her back, and Kyouka yelped in surprise.

"Forty-five minutes to go, huh?" asked Nejire, bouncing about on the balls of her feet. "Five more minutes until you guys head down onto the field, woooo!"

Kyouka scrambled to regain her bearings. (Apparently, the sun was frying more than just her eyeballs.) "Oh, hullo again, Nejire," she said. She rubbed her eyes, opening them again to find Tamaki had appeared behind her, his hands shoved into his pockets and his eyes fixed at the floor. "Nice to see you too again, Tamaki-senpai."

"Even though I'm not performing, I still feel so nervous," Tamaki mumbled, to which Nejire rested her elbow on his shoulder and leaned heavily on him.

"There, there, Tama-Tama," she chirped. "At least now we talk like we used to and not have people giving us weird looks for calling our kouhai '_kouhai'_ and/or '_kids'."_

"That's a _you _thing, Nejire; I never called Kirishima my kid."

"Pffhahaha!" Nejire squished his cheek (much to Tamaki's dismay) and turned back to Kyouka. "You know, I was really surprised in college when people thought I was talking about _actual, biological children of mine_ when I talked about you guys as my kids. Also, want some Hichew?"

"Huh?" Kyouka blinked, and next thing she knew, Nejire was offering her a Wal-Mart bag full of loose Hichew candy she had somehow missed. "No thanks, I'm pla—" Wait, no. She was conducting tonight.

Kyouka scratched the back of her head, tempted. "No, I shouldn't," she said, tearing her gaze away from the bag of candy. "It sets a bad example."

"Suit yourself!" Nejire slipped the bag onto her arm, pulled out a Hichew, tore it open, and tossed it into her mouth.

"See, this is why your name was written in caps, italicized, bolded, _and_ underlined three times on the '_**NEVER SELL CANDY TO THIS PERSON'**_ list."

Kyouka jumped, nearly dropping her baton from surprise. She turned around to find Mr. Aizawa looming over her and giving the Aizawa-Sensei Stare of Disapproval™ to Nejire, who laughed so hard, Kyouka was afraid she'd choke.

"I want some!" Eri jumped down three whole stairs in order to run over and get her tiny hands on some sweets. Nejire opened up the bag to her, and she shoved a fistful of the sweets into her jacket pocket.

"You're going to be on the list too in high school if you keep that up, Eri," Mr. Aizawa warned, to which his daughter made a disproportionately dramatic sound of shock and horror. "Yes, and I'll add your name to the list the second you walk into the band room, and then I'll use my network of high school spies to spread the news through the black market so that none of the students will sell you candy either or else face my shadowy wrath."

His voice was bland and flat (not unlike every other time he spoke), and there really should have been _no way_ that a lie so obvious would work on a twelve-year-old, but Eri obediently put half her stolen stash back in the bag. She was sad for a moment, but she soon spotted the flutes playing cards on the bleachers, and ran to go bother Deku.

Mr. Aizawa turned his attention to Kyouka and said, "They changed up the order of performing so that we go last in the pregame. Don't head down until ten minutes to the game."

"Yes, sir."

* * *

Kyouka watched the teenage boys in padded armor run back and forth on the field to chase a ball around in a way she never did really understand. As long as she could see UA's little teenage soldiers get to their end of the field such that the score went up, she was good.

"By the way, who are we playing today?"

Kyouka looked to her right to see Momo joining her in leaning against the fence surrounding the bleachers. "Yaomomo, _you_ were the one who wrote '_Homecoming game against Ketsubutsu'_ on the band calendars," she said.

Momo laughed, caught red-handed, it seemed. "You just looked so lonely up at the front of the band by yourself," she said.

Before Kyouka could reply, the stands erupted in cheers, and the commentator announced a touchdown for UA.

Kyouka swore, pushed Momo back to her instrument, and gathered herself to conduct the band.

"Fight song!" she shouted, and in an instant, the band was on it.

Kyouka looked over her shoulder at the game as she conducted, making sure they didn't mistakenly play through an injury. There wasn't one, since while their team might not be the best, they at least had strong bones, but she _did_ see the first few members of the Ketsubutsu band had begun trickling into the opposite stands.

Her gut tightened. But she didn't know why.

The fight song finished without a hitch, and she sat the band back down. Percussion began their _Go!_ cadence, and Momo returned to her side.

"You should go back to the bleachers," Kyouka said to Momo. "I don't think you want to be running back and forth between me and your instrument all night."

"Half a night," Momo corrected, which caught Kyouka off-guard. "I'm going to the dance with Shoto after halftime."

Kyouka went back to staring at the Ketsubutsu kids filing in. "Right," she said.

"Besides," Momo continued. "Awfully pessimistic of you to assume that I wouldn't be willing to run around all night just to keep you company."

Kyouka rolled her eyes. "You're just disgustingly optimistic. Like, are you really going to show up to a dance already sweaty from running around for half the night? I can't imagine Todoroki enjoying that."

"Kyouka, I've been to a school dance before. It's shockingly sweaty in there anyway."

Kyouka broke, finally allowing herself to snicker.

"Besides, everyone's sweaty after field show anyway," Momo said.

For some reason, her best friend's words struck a chord in Kyouka. "They are?" she asked, because _she_ knew _she'd_ always been sweaty after performing for band, but that was a different era, the Golden Age under Togata. (And now, they were at some Tarnished Age under Kyouka.)

"Of course. Everyone's trying their best to meet your standards," answered Momo. "Yeah, I've heard others talk about how you've still got really big shoes to fill, but people still appreciate the fact that you work so hard to keep things the same."

Kyouka felt a little lighter. "I'll bring your flute back to the band room for you after the game tonight," she decided.

"I hope you didn't just decide that now because I flattered you."

Kyouka laughed, then gave Yaomomo a friendly push. "Of course not!"

The buzzer rang, and the first quarter was over.

* * *

Saluting the opposing team's pep band after halftime was always a highlight of football games, provided the opposing team brought along a band in the first place. As the sole drum major candidate last year, Kyouka had been allowed to participate in the salute _once, _when Shiketsu came over for _last_ year's Homecoming game. Togata had thought it would be fun for them to have a little "_Naruto demonstration"_ as their salute, and, well, he was right. Kyouka _still_ thought that the clone-jutsu thing where she and the rest of executive council jumped out from behind him was a _hilarious _idea.

Unfortunately, Bakugou and Kendou were less amused by the idea.

"No way. I saw you guys do that Naruto shit last year, and I refuse to have any part in it," said Bakugou.

Kendou put a hand on her shoulder. "Jirou," she said." Kyouka. Let me speak to you not as the band president, but as a fellow alto sax player: I just don't think we can pull it off."

Kyouka sighed and cast a glance up at the stands, where a few band members were packing up their things to leave for the dance. "I guess," she sighed.

"_But," _Kendou continued, "I have a pretty good idea for a routine you and Bakugou can do."

"If this has _anything_ to do with making us do some dumb otaku shit, I'm not down," growled Bakugou.

"Don't worry," said Kendou with a growing smile. She tugged the baton out of Kyouka's hands and said, "I know something you guys can do better."

* * *

Never had Kyouka ever known _anyone_ or _any band_ to have a single baton change hands between two people twirling. And never had she ever thrown the baton up in the air under the expectation that someone else would catch it.

Yet there she was, on the dark racetrack by the field, standing in the middle of both Ketsubutsu _and_ UA's bands with Bakugou and the rival drum majors during the third quarter of the football game. And she was in the middle of an impromptu baton routine, so terrified of messing something up that she couldn't even hear her band losing their _minds_ over how high she tossed the baton.

She stepped back, and Bakugou stormed forward to finish what Kendou had somehow talked them into.

He caught it (both _of course,_ and yet also _somehow), _but instead of continuing on with an elaborate routine on the spot, he did a simple neck wrap before pointing the baton straight at the Ketsubutsu head drum major and staying like that.

There was a moment of dumb silence where the only things to be heard were Kyouka's pounding, _terrified_ heart, and Bakugou's intense, heavy breathing.

Then, both bands lost their _minds._

The Ketsubutsu acting drum major, a senior Kyouka recognized from previous years' encounters as Shindou, threw his head back and laughed. Bakugou dropped his arm back to his side and lazily tossed the baton back to Kyouka, who, startled, had to scramble to catch it.

"I see there's a reason _you_ had to catch the baton after all that," Shindou smugly said to Bakugou.

Kyouka's cheeks burned with rage, and she tightened her grip on the baton until her knuckles turned white.

Bakugou looked at Shindou's outstretched hand with scorn. "Shut the fuck up," he said, somehow not losing his cool. "Like she'd mess up something _that _fucking simple."

Blood returned to Kyouka's fingertips. (She hadn't even realized how cold they were getting until they were warm against the autumn air.)

Shindou withdrew his hand unshaken so that he could cross his arms. "Well," he said, standing on his tiptoes and craning his neck to search for someone in the back of the UA crowd. "It's your Homecoming game, and I see one, _two_ familiar alumni faces from your last year's council. What happened to, mmm, that one guy? You know, the one who looked like Tintin?"

Kyouka had to work to cool her boiling blood. She took a step forward to stand next to Bakugou, and Kendou took that as her cue to step forward as well.

"His name is Togata, and he couldn't make it," Kyouka coldly said.

Shindou hummed, then dropped back down. "What a shame. I always thought he did so well at the triband collaboration last year. He ran a _real clean_ field show, you know?" He stuck out his hand again and flashed a smile some would call _million-watt._ (Kyouka called it _obnoxious.)_ "The name's Shindou, Ketsubutsu's head drum major, and these three lackeys behind me are my fellow majors Makabe, Touteki, and Nakagame."

Fortunately, Kendou took one for the team this time, stepping forward and shaking Shindou's slimy hand. "Kendou, band president," she said, then gestured with her head for the two drum majors to introduce themselves.

"Bakugou, assistant drum major," grumbled Bakugou through some terrible vocal fry.

"Jirou, head drum major," said Kyouka through gritted teeth.

"Good to meet you three! I must ask, how's your senior year going, Miss President?" asked Shindou, jovially shaking Kendou's hand as though the drum majors weren't both sending him death glares. "I'm sure someone as put-together as you seem has begun your college applications by now. Where are you planning to go?"

Kendou laughed nervously. "I'm actually still a junior," she said, her smile starting to falter.

(Kyouka started to wonder how much longer this handshake was going to continue.)

"Ah, that explains why it's not Miss Fuwa's hand I'm shaking right now!"

There was a horrible and impossibly loud _**CRRRRRACK!**_

The referee blasted their whistle, and the football game came to a grinding halt. "_Injured player!"_

The second Kyouka caught these words, she blew her own whistle and called her band to attention. In the silence, she watched Kendou drop Shindou's hand with a satisfied smirk on her face.

* * *

Ketsubutsu's band had to leave at the end of the third quarter, much to Kyouka's good fortune. She had time to cool her head and be alone at the fence again.

She sighed and looked at the remainder of the band left. Mostly, it was a bunch of freshmen and sophomores, not yet as interested in dances as their senpai. There were one or two seniors. A few juniors, though she found it notable that Kaminari was nowhere to be found. He left his trombone with his friends at least, but _wow,_ had he really been so excited to go to the dance with whatever new girl he'd found to go in her stead that he couldn't even be bothered to put it back into its case? What a fucking _tart._

She closed her eyes and shook her head as she turned to face the game again, only to freeze halfway when she found herself face-to-face with said tart.

"Yo, Jirou! You look lonely all up here by yourself," he said, happy as a clam.

Well, so much for being alone again. But, the way he, like Momo, had thought of keeping her company was a little bit endearing. (Just a little bit.)

"You know, I'm not really in the mood," Kyouka said, darkening her expression again. He was being an awful lot like Shindou right now, and she didn't need that.

"Oh, well, I can go back if you want," he said, pointing to his friends. "Cards Against Humanity is more fun with four."

"I'm surprised Mr. Aizawa's allowing that at all," Kyouka muttered under her breath.

"What was that?"

Kyouka stared at him from over her shoulder. "Do whatever you want," she said, then settled back into leaning against the fence.

Kaminari settled into his place beside her. (What kind of blond himbo _was _he to not leave?)

((Well. It was nice to have company.))

* * *

By popular demand, she gave what was left of the band a speech before letting them back into the band room. They laughed at her closer— the usual "_Put your hearts into it, and we'll look stellar!"—_ which at least made her smile.

And just like that, Homecoming was over.

She was removing her Hell Shoes when some first years started shouting in the back.

"Someone start _The Day! _I wanna play! Who usually starts _The Day?"_

_The answer to that is Todoroki, _Kyouka absently thought as she massaged her hamstrings. _And unfortunately, he's out at the— _

Someone jumped onto a chair with startling, audible force, and a trumpet began to blast _The Day. _

Other people scrambled to stand atop chairs and join in on the band's iconic post-game song. "I CALL THE COWBELL PART!" shouted a voice Kyouka recognized as Mina's (which explained why she could hear her above the aggressive trumpet blasting).

Well, if one of the _uniform managers_ was joining in, there was no point rushing to pack up her uniform, now was there? (Kyouka zipped up her uniform bag anyway.) She carefully hung it on a practice room door and stood up in an attempt to get a glimpse at who had started it all.

_Bakugou?_

She blinked a couple times, surprised. Well, that explained the blasting, but she had no idea he'd continued playing trumpet after switching to percussion. (Well, maybe he hadn't, but _The Day_ did _not _have an easy trumpet part.) Whose trumpet was that even?

Her phone vibrated in her pocket.

Kyouka pulled it out and read the message from Momo.

[10:08]

_[Yaomomo (✿◡‿◡)]: Shoto says to tell Bakugou to wash out his mouthpiece for him_

_**[Kyoukanut]: ? ? ?**_

_[Yaomomo (✿◡‿◡)]: He asked Bakugou to bring his trumpet back for him_

_**[Kyoukanut]: how did he know bakugou was gonna play it? ? ?**_

_[Yaomomo (✿◡‿◡)]: BAKUGOU'S PLAYING IT?!_

Oh, boy.

Well, at least trumpets didn't need reeds! (Kyouka shuddered at the thought of sharing a reed.)

So that was another mystery solved, albeit at the price of the rare Caps Lock Momo. Frankly, some brass players were just Like That, but that didn't mean Kyouka wanted to be around to watch this end. There was no telling _where_ it was gonna go.

Still, she opened up her phone camera and began recording the chaos, just so that she wouldn't have to use words to explain what was happening to Momo. She zoomed in on Bakugou just as the song finished, only to catch him immediately empty the spit valve on tape. _(WHOOPS.)_

[10:11]

_**[Kyoukanut]: yaomomo im so sorry  
**__**[Kyoukanut]: [file attached: bakublasting the video]**_

_[Yaomomo (✿◡‿◡)]: I… _

_[Yaomomo (✿◡‿◡)]: Shoto says it's fine as long as he takes care of the trumpet_

_**[Kyoukanut]: cool cool**_

Despite his unchecked aggression, Kyouka knew that Bakugou cared about band. Heck, she was pretty sure she'd once seen him pull out a bottle of valve oil to clean off a bass drum, so at least they could all sleep at night knowing he was capable of proper trumpet maintenance.

_Now_ _it's time to return these uniforms, _she thought, quickly searching around for Momo's uniform bag as well as her own briefly-misplaced bag. (She found it within two seconds, of course, but _man_ was she scatterbrained tonight.)

"Yo, Bakugou, Todoroki said to clean out his trumpet when you're done with it," she said to the other drum major as she exited.

"Who the fuck do you think I _am?"_ Bakugou snapped as he turned on the sink.

"An asshole."

"_Fuck_ you."

There was no line to the uniform room when she got there. Tooru apparently hadn't participated in the post-game concert and had quickly served all the other band members who would have rather just gone home.

"I'll help you wash out my uniform shirt on Monday," Kyouka promised, but Tooru waved her off.

"Don't worry about it; you're the only one who wears this shirt. Just wait until we're done with field show season; that's when we clean and sort everything out again anyway."

"You mean after the triband collaboration?" Kyouka stepped out of the way to let others hand Tooru their uniform.

"Yeah, around then," Tooru replied, airy despite basically telling Kyouka to let her uniform shirt ferment for a month. "Maybe a little after. Mr. Aizawa said that me and Mina should start taking inventory of the old Rose Parade uniforms soon."

Kyouka's gut tightened for the second time that night, and for the second time that night, she could not quite identify why.

She pushed the feeling away and nodded. "Gotcha," she said, then turned to leave. "Thank you for the hard work!"

"_Please,_ I'm helping too!" said Mina as she entered the hallway.

Kyouka rolled her eyes good-naturedly and left.

There was a line of people waiting outside the hall. Not as many as usual, but still enough to let her feel smug passing them by. Someone waved at her as she passed by. Absently, she waved back, and it was only when she was sitting in the back of her dad's car that it dawned on her that it had been Kaminari waving at her.

_What a weirdo,_ she thought.

* * *

**_Author's Note vi. _**_for some reason it's really easy to get insecure abt the writing in this fic but honestly when i read it myself it's just so much fun and it makes me really happy so i really have no idea where all those feelings come from lol. __anyway some fun bits for elaboration:_

_\- something really weird that happened to me in college was that i casually talked about my underclassmen as my "kids" and some people actually thought i meant i had actual biological children.  
\- i actually made an arrangement of the first bnha op ("THE DAY") for a marching band that would be absolute hell to play and would probably sound like shit played irl, but it was arranged with player fun in mind, not good sound (that's why it has a cowbell part lol). it was also based a little bit off the song my band played after band events, which started with a trumpet solo, and i have a soft spot for trumpet players so i carried that over into the fic LOL  
\- __while the characters are gonna be talking about the rose parade (yeah the january 1st broadcasted-on-national-television rose parade), it's not really gonna be a focus as much as it is a backdrop that gets mentioned from time to time  
\- i've also never known anyone to do a thing where someone tosses up a baton with the intent for someone else to catch it, but our color guard did that kind of thing with their flags, and that was hella awesome  
\- in my junior year, when we were playing against one of our sister schools, they'd brought along a band, and our drum majors (of which we had four) actually did do that naruto clone-jutsu thing as their salute to the opposing band, and it is to this day still one of the funniest things that has ever happened to me in band_

_more notes on my tumblr (**a-piece-of-shipping-trash**), but those are just the important ones imo~ again, thanks for reading, leave a review, and as always, have a greaaaat daaaayyyy~~~_

* * *

**_Next Chronologically: _**_Chapter 8_


	7. King of Anything

**Previous Chronologically: **Chapter 4

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**Word Count: **1,122

* * *

Substitutes in math class were _great._ So rarely did subs know enough about math to teach a lesson on it that substitutes in math class all but _guaranteed_ a free period.

Which was perfect for Denki's purposes because just about two hours ago, drum major Jirou had turned down his invitation to take her to the Homecoming dance, and he needed to _lament._

"How you feelin', dude?" asked Kirishima, switching seats with the person behind him so that he could sit right next to Denki.

"I dunno, man," Denki replied, half mumbling with his chin on the table. His teeth loudly and sharply clacked together when he shut his mouth at the end of every sentence, almost serving as some sort of weird, audible period punctuation. "I guess I'm just a little disappointed."

Kirishima nodded sagely, having been a _personal_ contributor to the Homecoming Plan. "Yeah, I thought for sure it was foolproof!"

But Mina wasn't fully sold. "Well then, I guess that makes the two of you _clowns,"_ she dryly remarked. She crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow at Denki. "Tell me again what you guys came up with?"

Denki pushed himself up so that he was now at least slouching properly. "Well, since I don't sit near her in any of our classes, we figured that if I asked her to Homecoming during band one day, it might work out, since she'd at _least_ recognize me from band."

Kirishima grunted twice in confirmation. "And then the idea was that she'd accept so that she wouldn't have to third-wheel Todoroki and Yaoyorozu, and from there, he'd be able to hang out with her and then casually explain at the dance or something that they were soulmates."

"Exactly," said Denki. He sat up and made little talking heads with his hands. "And then it would be all like, 'Oh, how romantically convenient that we're at a dance together, then! You clever, clever man! This moment makes up for all the times you ruined my practice sessions with your trashy music that I think I might actually start liking!' and I'd be like, 'Of course, my lady~ Come, let us dance!' and then we would dance, and it would be like—"

Mina made it very clear she was giving Kirishima a horrified and disgusted look as Denki had his little talking head-hands kiss multiple times.

"Dude," she said, grabbing one of his wrists to make him stop. "What— and now listen carefully for this because I can_not_ stress this enough— _the __fuck__."_

Denki sighed and dropped the little puppet show. "Okay, so I _know_ that it wouldn't have gone _exactly_ like that but—"

"Denki," Mina interrupted.

Suddenly, he realized that she was _pissed. _He gulped.

"Let's rewind," said Mina, calmly smiling as she gently patted both boys' arms.

The boys exchanged terrified looks, but nodded anyway.

"First of all, at what point did you confirm that Kyouka was going to go to the Homecoming dance regardless of whether she was asked or not?" Mina asked.

Oh no.

"…Never," Denki answered, sheepish.

"We just kind of assumed," added Kirishima.

Mina picked up her worksheet and smacked the both of them with it. "Well, you know what happens when you assume things, hmm? '_They make an ass out of u and me.'_"

The boys hung their heads in shame.

"Second of all," continued Mina, "did you even _try_ to flirt with her before executing all this?"

"No," said Denki. "I told you, I don't sit near her in any of my classes."

"You _idiot!"_ Mina tapped the desk with the flat of her fingers so that she could get the effect of slapping the desk without all the attention of the sudden noise. "What about lunchtime? You already know there's people practicing field show music in the band room during lunch. Why didn't you just do that and ask her to count for you or something?"

Denki stared at his hands, destroyed. "I… I don't know."

Mina shook her head and reached out to put a hand on Kirishima's shoulder. "I'm so disappointed in you, Ei," she said. "I really did believe you'd absorbed enough of my romantic sense through osmosis to know better by now."

Kirishima awkwardly patted her hand with a sheepish grin. "I guess I just need more practice," he said.

Mina withdrew her hand and resumed the offensive. "See, _that's_ what went wrong here, Denki," she said. "She doesn't _know_ you. Of _course_ she was gonna turn you down! Do you know how _weird_ it is to be asked to a dance by someone you never talked to?"

Denki sat back in his chair and let his head loll back, decidedly deceased from Mina's attacks.

Mina sighed. "Like, okay, _you_ know her— '_know'_ here in massive air quotes— but that's because you started _noticing_ her first! She hasn't _had_ those same experiences as you that would make her pay attention to you. You're not the center of the world! Surprise, surprise, Chargebolt, but _not everyone sees you_ all the time! What you have to do is make her start _seeing_ you, _noticing_ you, so that you can become friends first. Friends ask each other to dances all the time, you know."

"Okay, but _the friend zone."_

"Denki. Look at me."

Denki sat up straight, folded his hands atop his desk, and looked at Mina.

"I saw Kyouka turn you down this morning. I saw how you looked like she was breaking some sort of perfect script you wrote in your head. Listen carefully to me, Denki: You are not entitled to Kyouka's feelings just because she's your soulmate. Why do you think people date in the first place?"

"Tradition?"

"No!" Mina slammed a fist into her palm. "Because being soulmates is just a jumping off point! Platonic soulmates exist, too, you know! If it doesn't work out, then it doesn't work out, man!"

Denki scratched the back of his head. "You know, for someone whose head is so far up Cupid's ass, you sure are stubborn about this."

"Shipping's no fun if you only go for what everyone thinks is gonna be canon." Mina stretched her arms and yawned. "Anyway, you need to experience the joys of strangers to friends to lovers for yourself. Go out there, and become her friend, dude!"

"How, though."

"It's simple!" Mina rested her elbows on his desk and used them to prop up her chin, which showed off her smile. "Just talk to her when you see the chance."

* * *

**_Author's Note vii. _**_hehe short chapter. next week is an even shorter chapter, but then again, it's not like i have maximum or minimum word counts on these bc of the way i have everything planned out. if i had to split up or consolidate chapters, the parts where i go "prev/next" would become a nightmare to reorganize ugh. _

_the other day on a server some other fic writers were googling their usernames for funsies and so i joined in, not expecting to really find anything, and i was really taken aback to find this fic on a kmjr rec list on reddit, where it was deemed, "incomplete but still worth reading" and i was like, "wow... people actually do enjoy reading this fic" y'all just don't like to say anything bc i guess there's not much to say rn hahaha. that's okay bc there really isn't much to say right now. nothing really Dramatic has happened, and if i may be so bold, i don't think a whole lot really happens in general throughout this fic. it's more of a character driven story, but some of the really major moments are skipped over until later in the story for Dramatic Effect n stuff. i guess it doesn't feel like as much to me bc i'm used to writing plot-driven stories. _

_a bit of worldbuilding in this chapter, so that's nice. more notes on my tumblr (**a-piece-of-shipping-trash**), leave a review, and as always yeah have a great day~~_

* * *

**Next Chronologically: **Chapter 6


	8. Summer Winter

**Previous Chronologically: **Chapter 6

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**Word Count: **699

* * *

Homecoming was a really great finale to the first quarter of junior year. Gave it that real _literary flair_ and _flavor_ from feeling like a satisfactory conclusion to a story arc.

Of course, even though there were happily ever afters (if Kyouka could really _count_ that mess of a Homecoming game as a '_happily ever after'), _there was still always the day after that. And the day after that, and the day after _that… _

Well, now it was _two _days after that, the first Monday of quarter two. Bakugou was conducting for the next football game, so Kyouka could finally chill out a bit more in zero period again.

She walked into AP Lang feeling calmer than she'd ever remembered walking into Lang before.

Then she saw the whiteboard.

_**PERIODS 1, 2, 4:**_

_New quarter, new seats!  
Start __The Scarlet Letter_

"Nice sitting next to you, Shinsou," she said to her fellow purple emo sitting across from her.

"You too, Jirou," replied Shinsou with a yawn. "Though, maybe if I'm lucky, I'll be relocated to the back where I can sleep."

Kyouka snorted. "Yeah. I bet they can see your eye bags from the stands."

"Yeah, well, if they can see me, they'll start listening for me, and pretty soon they'll realize how great a saxophone player I am."

"You'll never be as good as me, bari boy."

The witty banter would have continued a little longer, but unfortunately, the tardy bell rang. Shinsou pulled at an eye bag and poked out his tongue at Kyouka before he was moved to his new seat. She returned the favor before gathering up all her things and moving to her new seat in the back of the class.

She wasn't concerned enough about her new neighbors to even bother listening for their names. She simply sat down and started rifling through her backpack for her English notebook, ignoring the sound of someone dropping their backpack into the seat across from her. Of course, that _was _until…

"Hey there, head drum major."

Kyouka _froze._

There was no way. It wasn't possible. Whaaat? There was _no way_ that voice belonged to whom she thought it did. They had no classes together! She was hearing things, surely. No way. No _way. _

"Fancy sitting across from you now."

Kyouka felt like a machine was forcing her head to turn to the voice.

This _had_ to be a prank. A prank by someone who was just _really good_ at impressions of band members. She— she would have _known_ if she had this class with him!

Kaminari Denki grinned at her with that same million-watt smile he gave her when he asked her to Homecoming, except this time it seemed a _lot_ more confident.

Internally panicking, she looked to the other two desks at their table, only to find both other members _absent. _

She felt her cheeks start _burning. _

"I— I had no idea you were in this class too!" she said, giving herself a heavy mental beating for never realizing. She looked away and rested her head on one hand in an attempt to hide her furious blush. "S-sorry for not knowing who you were."

"It's whatever," Kaminari assured her. "It was dumb of me to have assumed that you would back then."

Kyouka tried to grab her copy of _The Scarlet Letter_ by using her peripherals alone (so that she wouldn't have to look at him again), but she must have really sucked at that because Kaminari pushed the book right into her field of view for her. She felt her face turn redder than that stupid letter the book probably talked about, and never before had she wanted to die as badly as she did right then.

(Was this really how the whole quarter was going to be?)

"Anyway," Kaminari continued, opening the book up and loudly flipping through the pages. "I guess this'll be a good opportunity to get to know each other, huh?"

Kyouka opened up _The Scarlet Letter_ to a random page and hid her face behind the book.

No lie, _hell_ would have been kinder than this.

* * *

**_Author's Note viii. _**_hey tiny tiny chapter. also here to tell you that this fic is gonna be taking a quick two week break~ why? well, remember in like, chapter three i said "this fic will be updating fridays and/or mondays"? and that i'd elaborate more on it later?_

_congratulations it's later now! :D_

_so basically, there was originally going to be this kiribaku secondary/subplot going on here, but as i was in the early stages of redeveloping this fic after its initial 2019 hiatus, i got kind of overwhelmed by trying to fit that into this fic, so i decided to split it off into its own, separate fic (titled_ rhythm of the heart) _in order to "decrease the scope" of this one. what this means is that while these two stories can be read separately without any losses (if i can pull this off, though my chapter outlines/plans currently have all major plot points confined to their individual stories), together, they do form one larger story with a bigger picture, and i like to refer to this collective as_ perfect harmony._ big things that happen in _moment_ will be little things happening in the background of _rhythm_ and vice versa. fun references will be scattered throughout both, though it shouldn't diminish enjoyment if you don't catch them. _

_again, each story can be read separately without any losses! the way i write this au is specifically designed so that everything can be read on its own. but that should explain why the "next chronologically" bit this time refers to _rhythm_ chapter 4. smth to keep in mind is that the slash below doesn't mean that R4 & M13 happen at the same time; it just means that if you're not interested in reading _rhythm, _the next chronological chapter would be _moment_ chapter 13. if two chapters are happening concurrently, they'll be separated with a | instead of a slash. _

_as usual, Extra Notes (which are mostly just fun facts/trivia abt the au/characters and tie-ins to the bits of inspiration i took from my real life) are up on my tumblr (**a-piece-of-shipping-trash**) tagged under "hua's vanity", "Bb notes: music of the moment", or "Bb notes: perfect harmony" depending on if you're looking for extra notes on all my fics, this fic, or this + rhythm, respectively. see you monday (if you wanna read _rhythm_) or in two weeks~ next chapter is a uhhh timeskip where we get some fun kmjr conversation. _

_leave a review~~_

* * *

**Next Chronologically: **Rhythm 4 / Moment 13


	9. December

**Previous Chronologically:** Moment 13 | **Happening Concurrently:** Rhythm 1)

* * *

**Word Count: **1,465

* * *

Denki was a simple lad. When his friends needed a pep talk in a practice room, he _gave_ them a pep talk in a practice room. When his friends needed him to get out of the practice room so that they could talk about an important, secret plan with the assistant drum major, he _got_ out of the practice room, called over Bakugou, and let them talk about whatever important, secret things that there were.

Even simpler still, he had absolutely _no_ plans on how he should spend his lunch period in the band room just all by himself!

_Wait a second— _

"Fuck," he quietly said the second the practice room door clicked shut behind him and he _officially _could not walk back in. What was he going to do with thirty-five minutes in the band room when in his head was playing the exact _opposite_ of Christmas songs in the form of punk goth bands from the late 2000s?

He scanned the band room, hoping that by some miracle, there was someone he could zip up to and chat with because it was a _bit_ too late into the year to go around trying to break into other people's band squads by himself.

Well, luckily for him, December was the season of miracles.

He skidded over to Jirou, who sat by herself on the stool kept in the middle of the room for some reason, bobbing her head to the beat of her headphones as she scrolled through her phone.

"_Heeeey_ there, head drum major~" he said, feeling a little smug.

Jirou shut off her phone before he could see what she was looking at, freed one ear to listen to him with, and gave him a raised-eyebrow look. "Well, if it isn't Mr. '_What Does Bosom Mean'_ of the trombone players," she dryly replied, though Denki could tell she was _clearly_ smothering a smile. "Fancy seeing _you_ out of practice room doors."

He pulled up a chair from the front row and sat on its back with his feet resting on the seat. "Just wondering why someone as _musically adept_ as yourself is doing wasting a lunch period _not practicing,"_ he said, propping his chin up on his elbow to emphasize his grin.

Jirou rolled her eyes, hit a button on her headset, and the disco briefly ceased its panicking. "Funny," she said, now mirroring him by propping her _own _chin up on her _own_ elbow, "_I_ was just wondering why someone as _musically defunct_ as yourself is doing _wasting_ a lunch period not practicing."

"You _wound_ me, m'lady. Why, if you had ever bothered to _listen_ to me practice, I'm sure you'd find yourself quite speechless." _Please take the hint, please take the hint, please take the hint… _

Jirou laughed, reaching out and slap-patting him in the arm like she thought his joke was good, but still pitiable. "Like someone who spends every lunch period practicing in a soundproof room and yet _still_ can't seem to get the hang of the march could render me speechless with his playing. Like, seriously, dude, you wanna know something _wild?"_

"What?" Denki asked, already sensing that all this subtle hint-dropping didn't not work on only guys. (A sense that he found, quite irritatingly, to be manifesting in the form of a twitching eyebrow.)

"It's kind of crazy, but almost every lunch period this year when I _do_ practice in a practice room with Yaomomo, if I listen carefully, I can sometimes hear a couple low brass players joining in as well."

(Hnnghhh that was _him. _And Kirishima. (Was she telling him to listen to _himself _play _his own part?_ Did it not simply matter that he was _hearing_ himself?))

"That's absolutely buck wild, my dude," Denki flatly said, but her laughter was too giddy to notice his tone, and his heart was too soft to interrupt her happiness. "By the way, where is Yaomomo anyway? I need help on some stuff later."

"She and Todo-dorky are studying for their calc final, and like…" Jirou trailed off and made a face. "Third wheeling really, _really_ sucks. Especially when math is involved."

Denki immediately slouched in a half-assed emulation of an anime character falling down when they heard something hilariously plan-ruining. "Ah, I see," he managed.

Jirou's face morphed into one of concern. "Why, what did you need help with?" A bit of the devil slipped into her smirk. "Other than everything, of course."

"Japanese."

She made a face at him. "_Japanese?" _she asked. "You're in Japanese ⅚?"

"No, no, no," Denki said. "AP. I had to give it up in favor of AP Physics because in my humble, student opinion, whoever decided what classes were taught what period deserves to be _fired_ for making them happen at the same time."

Surprisingly, Jirou nodded. "Yeah. My counsellor didn't even ask me which one I would have preferred; she just stuck me in AP Japanese when I _kind of_ need physics for college."

"Oh? What are you going to major in?"

"Music, of course." She looked at him like he was a nitwit, which, _fair, _he supposed. "But some schools make you learn the physics of sound, and I have _not_ heard good things about harmonics."

"Oh, well, um. That sucks, man." Denki rested his chin on his elbows again, which were in turn propped up on his knees, and gave her what he _hoped_ was a sympathetic look, not a pitying one.

Her face flushed a bit pink. She took an audible breath, bit her lip, then looked away. "Well, I asked for both of them anyway, so it's not that bad. I'm just salty that I wasn't asked."

He watched her hold that position until her skin went back to its usual shade, an awkward silence building tension with every passing second.

"_Anyway,"_ Jirou said, finally pulling her headphones down so that they rested around her neck and shaking out her head. "Bakugou's self-studying for AP Japanese, too. You could ask him; he's usually around here _somewhere…"_

Denki felt a drop of sweat fall down his neck and _driiiiiip_ slowly down his back like the caress of a very careless whisperer who didn't care that they were spitting in your ear. "You know what, I'll just ask him during Physics. He already helps me with that. Might as well bring it up then or something."

"That's fair." Jirou pulled out her phone and started scrolling through it again. "So, how'd you do on the last Lang test?"

* * *

"Oi, Kacchan, I just asked you for help memorizing kanji! What are we doing heading to the band room today?"

Bakugou looked over his shoulder at Denki to give him a stink eye. "It's rainin' today, so the library's gonna be full of fucking nitwits who will recognize my genius and start begging for help," he snapped. "Now hurry up. I'm getting all wet waiting for you."

Denki ran to catch up with his tutor. "If you were a girl, that would mean something very different," he said, _deeply_ pleased with his witty comment.

Bakugou's face twisted into one of the _deepest _grimaces of _**utmost **__disgust, _the likes of which Denki had never seen before and would most likely never see again. "That," he spat, "was _fucking_ disgusting. _Never_ say that to me _ever_ again or I _will_ kick your sorry little bitch ass."

Denki didn't even bother to smother his grin; he'd already won. "Of course," he meekly said, letting Bakugou yank open the band room door.

Bakugou stomped into the room, dropped his two-ton backpack onto a random chair, and began stomping right back out again. "I need to take a _**FUCKING**_ leak," he declared, pushing past Denki on his way out. "I'll help you when I'm done pissing."

"Cool, cool," Denki replied, though he had the sneakiest of suspicions that Bakugou wasn't exactly listening to him. However, he shrugged it off and for the first time, entered the band room on his free period.

The lights were already on, which, now that he thought about it, he wasn't too sure why that surprised him. Maybe it was because Mr. Aizawa's office was dark, maybe it was because there was only one other person in the room at the moment. (And it _wasn't_ Mr. Aizawa…)

Denki sidled up to the girl sitting on a chair in the center of the room, practically in a center stage spotlight waiting for him, her co-star, to join her in a witty dialogue.

"_Hey_ there, head drum major~"

* * *

**_Author's Note ix. _**_yes i did title this chapter "december" just bc we jump over november (for now) and right into december. _

_wow it feels like forever since i've updated this. i've been working really hard the last few days to get the chapter queue more filled out, since i was working through it for the last few weeks due to finals n stuff, especially since i'd like to be able to update this series twice a week sometimes (i.e. updating rhythm on a monday and then this the same friday instead of waiting a while between). i might also switch up the update days of both to either wednesdays or sundays, since i'm kind of noticing that having different update days has been... hmm... making the updates feel really irregular._

_also, if you noticed the "happening concurrently" thing up top, that just means that rhythm chapter 1 is happening at the same time as the events of this chapter, and so if you didn't hop on that train and are curious now, i guess rn would be a good place to start hahaha_

_anyway, i think i'm gonna stop putting the extra notes up on my tumblr (**a-piece-of-shipping-trash**) unless otherwise requested (and to anyone interested long after this chapter is published, yes, you may still ask), since it doesn't seem like anyone's too interested in it? they can be a bit of work to type up, but i'm more than willing to do it if someone takes the effort to ask. _

_but yeah! will be another two-ish week break to publish rhythm 3 n 4, though it might be a bit shorter if i feel like i have enough chapters prewritten to be able to keep up with the posting. thank you for reading, leave a review, and stay safe out there~~~_

* * *

**Next Chronologically:** Moment 10


	10. Cliché

**Previous Chronologically: **Moment 9 | Rhythm 1

* * *

**Word Count: **2,890

* * *

All right, so _maybe_ it turned out that Mr. Aizawa _had_ been in the band room; he'd simply been _sleeping_ in his _office_ the entire time, hence why the office light had been off.

Denki may or may not have found this out because when Bakugou came blasting back into the room shouting about stroke order, the office lights abruptly popped on (frightening all three students in the main room), and the old hobo man came rumbling out to shake a figurative stick at all of them until they packed their things and fucked right off to the uniform room to help Mina sort stuff out now that field show season was officially over.

"_Dude,_ Mina, what is _up_ with this place?" Denki asked as he walked in to find piles of half organized heaps separated into shirts, slacks, shoes, and the various other accoutrements that made up their uniforms.

Mina pouted as he and her drum majors entered the uniform room, slamming a shirt onto her lap in frustration. "Well, the only people really _managing_ this place is Tooru and me!"

Bakugou snorted, delicately stepping over a stack of surprisingly well-folded pants, which (thankfully) were at the very least _labelled._ "Yeah, and we all know how well you and Invisi-girl put away your music every morning."

Mina puffed out her cheeks and said, "Okay, but for real, like, _no one_ wants _freshmen_ up in here, the _seniors _don't give a—" she sneezed, but wiped her nose and continued anyway "—and the _sophomores_ are always all like, '_ohhh~ I have WHAP homework~ Sorry, Ashido-senpaiiii~~~' _like, bruh! No, I _don't_ understand your stupid WHAP struggle, but _you _volunteered for the job thinking it'll look good on college apps, so now it shouldn't surprise you that _you_ have to do the actual _work, _now should it? So come do your job before I come WHAP _you!" _She smacked her palm several times for emphasis.

"Better to be WHAP'd than whacked," Denki joked as he pranced over to her, the prancing being a necessary function of proper movement in a room as full of dirty laundry landmines as the uniform room.

"Oh, you know I'm gonna treat them like the same thing though," Mina snorted, finally returning to that shirt she had been folding. "Denki, can you finish up folding these shirts for me?"

"Sure thing, boss!" he chirped, hopping right into the same place Mina had occupied a few seconds ago. Better this than getting beat over the head with the school newspaper for forgetting how to write the word for "depression" in Japanese.

"Wait a second, that bastard's got—" Bakugou began, but within one hop, skip, and a jump, Mina had an arm around his shoulder, pulling him down to her level.

"Now, now, not so fast there, Mr. Angry Butter Hair; you should know by now that making out on campus is not allowed," Mina jokingly chided. Using her free hand, she flicked him between his furrowed eyebrows, giggling all the while, as it slowly dawned on Denki that yes, Bakugou's eyebrows _did_ in fact look like they were kissing when he got angry. "Besides, you're leading the parade on Saturday, aren't you? We need to make sure we have a drum major uniform that fits you ready."

The look Bakugou sent Denki made the latter feel as though the former felt he'd tricked him into coming here, but _hey!_ It wasn't _Denki's_ fault that _someone_ had woken up the band director and gotten them all kicked to out here! "I dunno, Mina. That would depend on if these clothes have been sized for—" he cut himself off, remembering the face Bakugou had made at his earlier joke out in the rain and deciding against that particular string of words.

Fortunately, the conversation was moving along at too fast a pace for anyone to really care.

"Kyouka, do me a favor and sort those shirts over by Denki into piles for Large, Medium, Small, and so on," Mina called as she dragged Bakugou off to a different corner of the room. "It should all be listed on the tag, unless someone went behind our backs and cut theirs off, in which case you're screwed until we can take inventory."

"Uhh, okay," said Jirou, who then hopped over to Denki.

"I'm sorry, was there something _wrong _with the uniform I wore for all the football games I conducted this season?" Bakugou asked, his voice snippy and sarcastic to the max.

"You stained it to hell and back, you sweaty, _sweaty_ little boy," Mina replied, _her_ voice as sweetly sarcastic as Bakugou's had been snippily sarcastic. "No amount of lemon juice and bleach can save that white dress shirt now."

"Not my fault the drum major's uniform is white," Bakugou huffed, but by this point, Denki didn't even care anymore.

Yeah, _sure,_ he had an AP to be studying for, and he'd have hell to pay later when it was May and he hadn't finished covering the whole textbook, but skipping out on _one day_ wasn't going to have _that_ huge of an effect.

(Still, he put a mental pin in his mental note to '_study later, at home'_ before completely putting the thought aside.)

"So, Jirou!" Denki cheerfully began, blissfully rebuttoning a shirt because that's what you did when folding up dress shirts, right? (He was _pretty _sure that's what you did.) "How have your other classes been?"

Jirou did that _pbbbb_ horse-sounding warm-up thing as she carefully laid aside another shirt. "Well, it's the last week of notes for APUSH before the Review Week of Hell for finals," she said. "And then in precalc right now, we're learning about—"

"Complex fractions; yeah, I know," Denki automatically supplied. "I said your _other_ classes, dude."

Denki managed to fold a whole shirt and a half before he realized that Jirou wasn't saying anything, so he paused for the express purpose of looking directly at her. "You didn't notice we had precalc together, did you?"

Jirou appeared to be very interested in the pile of dress shirts between them.

Denki snorted and got back to work. "And yet, you make fun of _me_ for not catching on until the book characters point stuff out themselves."

"I'm just saying, if you couldn't tell that Celie was a lesbian until—"

She was interrupted by Mina, who suddenly whooped _so_ loudly that everyone else in the room (and on campus) jumped out of their skin at least a _little_ bit.

"Look what I just found in the closet~" she sang, and Denki looked over to see her flaunting a very shiny, albeit very _wrinkled, _green dress.

"Ooo, nice," he said, nodding his head in approval.

Bakugou scowled as he fiddled with some buttons. "Looks like it's from _Shrek."_

"_That_ is a _compliment,"_ Mina said. She held the dress up to her chest, then frowned. "Seems kind of long on me, though…"

Jirou was making a very weird face. "Uhh, would Mr. Aizawa even let you keep that?"

Mina shrugged. "Who knows? Here, Denki, you try it on!" she said, tossing the dress in his direction.

Denki jumped up to catch it. "Oh, _fuck_ yeah!" he said, already tossing his jacket to the side.

"HEY, HEY, HEY!" Jirou _immediately_ started shouting as Mina burst into laughter. "Keep your shirt on!"

"Yeah, yeah, don't worry about that," Denki said, sticking his arms into the proper holes and tugging the dress over his head. "I'd like to consider myself a _gentleman, _who respects the things that women's eyeballs do not wish to see."

"Well, you certainly don't respect the things other people's ears don't want to _fucking_ hear," Bakugou snapped. He tugged at his collar, testing out how close he was to choking in that particular size of shirt.

"Hey, watch your _fucking_ language, bitch," Mina said, pointing at him as she grinned.

Bakugou rolled his eyes, Denki twirled around, and Jirou finally began to laugh.

* * *

The dress was admittedly quite itchy, even with a whole entire shirt between Denki's skin and the dress seams, so Mina soon took it back and hung it in a place of extreme esteem and honor (also known as the closet door).

Denki settled down on the floor again, back to having a pile of unsorted dress shirts sitting beside him and Jirou sitting before him, though for whatever reason, it didn't feel quite the same as when he'd hopped up. (Well, such was the nature of coming off a laughter high, he supposed.) "_So,_ Miss Jirou," he said, picking out a random shirt to fold. "Tell me more about how the classes you do _not_ share with me have been going."

Jirou dryly laughed as she set a shirt into its proper pile. "Actually, let's not talk about that," she said.

Denki cocked his head at her, inviting her to explain herself. He held it for a few seconds until she finally stopped ignoring it with a sigh.

"They're going fine, I guess," she said, pointedly looking down at her work. "There's always a lot that needs to be written, though, what with APUSH and AP Lang and AP Japanese, and also all the band council minutes that I always need to read and keep up on every week, but.." Here she paused, and Denki noticed the corner of her lip twitching, like she was almost wanting to smile, but the mood just wasn't quite right. "I mean, I guess it could be worse. I _do_ have _a pretty sweet Japanese partner_ helping me out."

Had Denki not been purposefully keeping _extremely_ careful tabs on his behavior, his jaw probably would have fallen to the floor (just like how his heart fell right into his stomach, letting its acid splash back up his throat). "Partner?" he asked, dropping the word with as much care as he could muster (which wasn't much, since, at the same time, he was internally screaming). "I didn't know you were dating anyone."

"_Huh?_ Where did you get that idea?"

All thoughts abruptly ceased running through Denki's mind, and for all of three seconds, his brain was practically showing him the blue screen of death. "Uhhhh…"

"Kaminari Denki dot EXE is now rebooting; please wait," Mina joked, who was sitting on the other side of the room, sorting out broken suspenders from the still-functional ones.

"I mean, you _did_ say you had, '_a sweet Japanese partner,' _so unfortunately, I'm gonna have to side with Sparky here due to ambiguity," Bakugou grunted as he plopped down a box right where Mina had ordered him to.

Jirou turned to face him. "How did you even _catch _that?" she asked.

But before Bakugou could grunt out a response, Denki jumped up, finally able to jump back into the conversation.

"Hah, see? I'm not stupid for thinking that!" he gleefully half-shouted.

"No, you're still definitely stupid for thinking that," Bakugou said. "I'm just saying that for once, I was able to follow your train of thought."

"So let's just get this straight," Mina said before any of this could boil over into another chaotic argument.

"No one in here is," Denki said with a grin, then paused, remembering something, and looked down at Jirou.

"Bi," she said, crossing her arms with her eyebrow raised as she answered the unspoken question.

"Hey, bi five!"

"I'm done here. Sayonara, _weeaboos,"_ Jirou said. She stood up and started walking away from Denki's outstretched hand, but signalled her joking intent by turning around at the door.

"Dang. Could've at least said, '_Bi-bye,'_ or something like that." Denki pouted.

Jirou rolled her eyes and didn't even break her stride as she turned her back on him yet again. "Okay, now I'm leaving for real."

Denki let out a little weenie cry. "Wait, no, I was just joking!"

Bakugou snorted in the background.

Jirou spun around for a half second and pointed at Denki. "And that's _exactly_ why! Your jokes? They're _crap._ I could shit something funnier out of my own—"

"Oh, my _god,_ could you guys just shut up for just a _second?"_ Mina groaned, leaning so far backwards in her frustration that the monster horns on her headband hit the wall and causing her to flinch. "Kyouka, so you're _not_ dating anyone, correct?"

Jirou pushed herself up against the doorframe using one of her legs. "Not to _my_ knowledge, no."

"So you're _single_ is what I'm hearing?" Mina said.

Jirou stood up straight, put one hand on her hip, put the other up over her eyes and looked mockingly around the room. "Are you saying I could have a _partner?" _she asked, then put both hands on her hips and leaned down to better look at Mina. "Show them to me!"

"Right here!" Denki shouted, jumping up to do a stupid pose mid-air, then immediately scrambling to not crash into a uniform rack right behind him. "This boy!"

Jirou leaned back and laughed, that kind of laugh that makes you spit out your milk mid-joke in the cafeteria. "That's cute," she said, wiping tiny tears from the corner of her eye.

Denki tried to be as obvious as he could when exchanging "_Can you believe this?" _looks with Mina, but alas, Jirou appeared to be too preoccupied with laughing at the idea to notice.

And then the bell signalling the end of school rang.

Pretty soon after, Bakugou's phone loudly vibrated. Bakugou unceremoniously dropped the box he was toting around and checked on it.

"Well, I've got shit to do," he loudly announced, swiping up his backpack as he marched out of the room. "Good _fucking_ luck studying Japanese on your own, Sparkplug."

Denki finger gunned Bakugou as the latter left. "Heck yeah, man!" he said, aggressively putting more mental pins into the mental note to STUDY WHEN HE GOT HOME LATER.

Tooru came hopping in right after, even stepping aside at the doorway to let Bakugou leave before she entered. "'Sup, Mina~!" she sang, still skipping around. "Ready for dance practice?"

Mina stood up, stretched, and surveyed the progress made in cleaning up the uniform room. Despite all their dicking around, it _was_ actually substantially cleaner (although admittedly, that was mostly thanks to Bakugou being made to move all the boxes around). "Yeah, I'm ready." She jumped over the pile of suspenders that remained unsorted in front of her. "Let's go!" she cheered, throwing her backpack over her shoulder, but pausing just outside the doorway.

"Oi, Chargebolt," she called. "Close up shop for me, okay?"

"Gotcha, man!" Denki said, saluting her for all of two seconds before he had to catch the lanyard of keys thrown at his face. Then he screamed a little bit.

Jirou, of course, laughed at this as well, until she suddenly stopped herself.

"Shit," she swore, pulling her phone out of her pocket and checking on something. "I forgot that Yaomomo's giving me a ride home today." She typed something out, then slipped the device back into her pocket. "I left my backpack in the band room."

"Oh, me too!" Denki parkoured over a couple things to get to the uniform room door.

Jirou snorted at his eagerness, but waited for him to lock the door behind them anyway.

* * *

"So, did I show you a good time today?" Denki asked her as he opened the band room door for the both of them.

Jirou laughed, as she had been quite apt to do all afternoon. "Sure, man," she said, stretching her arms before slinging her backpack over her shoulders.

Denki trotted after her and fetched his own backpack. "Maybe we could do it again sometime, then?" he asked, _hoping_ that it wasn't too soon for him to be asking such questions.

Jirou shrugged as the two of them left the band room again. "Depends on if Mina needs help again," she said, and _dammit, _that's _not_ what he meant.

Right outside the band room, a big, black car pulled into the parking lot, and a door opened to reveal Yaomomo sitting inside, waiting for her friend.

"That's my ride," Jirou said, adjusting the new weight on her back before she started running.

"Bye, Jirou~!" Denki called, waving her goodbye as she left him behind.

She turned to face him just before hopping into the car with Yaomomo, and she gave him a smile and a wave just before the door shut.

Denki watched the car leave, waving until it was out of sight.

He fell back on his heels, having raised himself to his tiptoes to make his waving more prominent, and grinned stupidly to himself. Not even the sad classical music that she was listening to in Yaomomo's car could bring him down.

That went pretty well, he had to say!

He had a pretty good feeling about all this! Everything was going to go just fine!

* * *

**_Author's Note x. _**_maybe i should stop writing all these chapters so far in advance because i do Not remember anything i was really thinking about when writing this chapter except that i wanted to rewrite it because i wasn't satisfied with its quality. it's honestly fine now that i've had time to sit on it. _

_this chapter was inspired a lot by the time i helped the uniform managers clean out our new uniform room because our previous cozy one had been leaked on or something. not leaked-on in a piss kind of way but like. a pipe leak or smth. anyway, we found a green dress cleaning it out and joked that we could put it on our head drum major and he'd pull it off better than anyone there in the room._

_extra notes are up on my tumblr (**a-piece-of-shipping-trash**) tagged under "Bb notes: music of the moment" nd "hua's vanity" as usual. if you guys are reading that, i'd love to hear about it! next chapter will be up in a week or two~ other than that, thanks for reading, and stay safe out there_

* * *

**Next Chronologically: **Rhythm 3 / Moment 23


	11. Party Tattoos

**Previous Chronologically: **Moment 28

* * *

**Word Count: **921

* * *

Today had been good to Kyouka.

Sure, it was still hardly half past twelve, but sometimes, things happened that were _so_ good that it was impossible for that day to ever be considered to have a net negative.

And _yeah,_ the whole semester had been more than a bit of a rough ride— running a band almost all by herself (by refusing all offers of help or advice) while managing the rest of her school life was tough. Now that finals were very nearly over, she could _maybe_ admit that she had also been a _bit_ over her head at _times. _

However, with the annual triband collaboration with Shiketsu and Ketsubutsu marking the end of field show season a little over a _month_ ago now, Kyouka was _certain_ that next semester with its parades and indoor concerts would be _significantly_ easier than this one had been.

She was humming again, too, for the first time in forever. She hardly even noticed it until she and Kaminari were alone together in Mr. Aizawa's office, helping the old man sort out sheet music after school, and there was this random, strangely _awkward_ spell of silence after she finished a song. Her soulmate wasn't even listening to anything at the moment, leaving the space between them feeling a little more distant than usual.

"So," she said to Kaminari after a spell, "what're you still doing on campus now that school's over? Don't you want to go home and vegetate, or whatever it is that idiots do in their spare time?"

"Well, for starters, I don't know why anyone would want to vegetate on a _beautiful_ day like today," Kaminari began.

"Ah, yes, another _beautiful day_ full of cloudy skies and drizzly clouds," Kyouka dryly commented.

"_Beauty_ is in the eye of the _beholder,_ my dear drum major."

"And _I_ never said I _didn't_ think rainy days were beautiful."

Kaminari shrugged. "Anyway, admit it. Hanging out with me isn't as bad as you always seem to wanna make it out to be."

"I never said I didn't like being around you."

"Could've fooled me."

Kyouka couldn't tell if he was being serious or not. (She felt a twinge of guilt.)

She sighed, although she tried to pass it off as an indignant huff. _(Well, if today was really going to be so good to her, she might as well try to pay it forward.)_

"I mean, even though I _have_ other friends outside of you— and that our friend circles are still pretty different— I still really like talking to you," she admitted, training her eyes squarely on the scores they were unshuffling together. "We're probably not gonna sit next to each other in Lang anymore next semester, but… _weshouldstilltalkmore."_

"Oh, yeah, watch me _sliiide_ into your DMs like—" he mimed playing the trombone for a second, poking her with the imaginary slide.

Kyouka cracked up, snorting so hard she had to drop her current stack of scores to cover her mouth for a second. "You know you can just text me like a normal person, right?" she said.

_Mistake._

Kaminari grinned at her. "Are you _asking _for my _number?"_

"No."

"Well, you can have it anyway." The blond boy pulled out his phone, then deflated for a sec. "Actually, hold out your arm," he said, plucking one of Mr. Aizawa's whiteboard markers out of a cup.

"_Why?" _Kyouka asked as she consciously drew her hand closer to her chest.

"My phone is dead!" Kaminari cheerfully replied. (It suddenly occurred to Kyouka how much more _chipper_ he was now compared to just a few minutes ago.) He did a quick marker test to confirm that it wasn't like most whiteboard markers (dead), then, grinning still, held out a hand to her.

Kyouka heaved an exasperated sigh and snatched the marker out of his hand. "You know it would just be easier to put your number in my _phone,_ right?" she said, making no motion whatsoever to offer him said phone.

"Yes, but would you have taken the initiative to text me first?"

"You don't know that!" Her nostrils flared, and she turned away. "Besides, aren't you just taking a bigger risk by only writing your number on my arm? For all you know, maybe I'll forget to put it in and wash it off."

Kaminari rolled up his sleeve and waved his bare arm in her face. "You're right," he said. "You should write _your_ number on _me, _then."

Kyouka stared at his noodly arm as it wiggled less than three inches away from her own face. "All right, then," she said, yanking it downward so that she could cradle it close to her chest. _This might as well happen!_ she thought as she scrawled her digits onto Kaminari's inner forearm in black whiteboard marker. "My phone automatically filters spam, though, so don't be weird about it."

"Oh, well then how about you hand over your phone so that it won't look like a random number's texting you, hmm?"

_Give them an inch, and they'll take a mile._

Exasperated, but not actually _mad, _Kyouka pulled out her phone, unlocked it, and handed it to Kaminari.

Today had been good to Kyouka.

(And, had she paid a little bit more attention to Kaminari as he handed her phone back to her, perhaps she would have noticed things were looking up for him, too.)

* * *

**_Author's Note xi: _**_i remember when i was writing this, the content i have planned for ch. 28 kept kinda making its way into this chapter and so i had to keep kinda beating it back with a broom like "no! you! stay! in! your! lane! ! !" so this chapter had to go through like. two rewrites and a bullet-point plan to get to this. _

_it's the end of another arc! uhh i don't have a name for this arc. but i do know that up next is the kegger arc, spanning from moment 12 to 16 (and also in the grander scheme of things also includes rhythm 7-10, but y'all already know you don't have to read rhythm if you're not interested). after that is their month of february, and then the tour arc, and then the final arc, but its name might be spoilery? i don't really have a name for it, but i guess if i had to pick a name i guess you could call it the prom arc. but that sounds kinda dumb to me so we'll have to see. _

_might take a break next week just for kicks, since up next in the publishing order is moment 12, but maybe i can have a little break in publishing between arcs. as a treat. we'll see how i'm feeling. i'm actually really excited to publish moment chapters for two weeks in a row again so this will probs be back again next week. _

_anyway, thank you for reading! i've started livestreaming myself writing fanfiction. follow me on tumblr (**a-piece-of-shipping-trash**) for updates and info on that i guess. it's a lot of fun and you will definitely get spoilers for this au if you vote to watch me work on this fic, but like. c'mon. it's fun. that aside, leave a review! stay safe out there~_

* * *

**Next Chronologically: **Moment 12


	12. Lollipop

**Previous Chronologically: **Moment 11

* * *

**Word Count: **2,520  
***this chapter is primarily a chatlog. it is recommended you read it on my ao3.**

* * *

"All right, boys! Let's get this kegger started!" Mina cheered as she walked into Sero's house, the last to arrive at the party. (Half an hour late, as usual.)

Kirishima snorted from his position on the couch, where he had his head resting on Denki's shoulder and his legs on Sero's lap. "The party never starts until Ashido arrives," he said.

"And neither does it _stop _until I'm _gone_," Mina snipped as she kicked her shoes off, one of which narrowly missed her own shin with the odd way _it_ was flung off. But, she ignored it and sauntered over to the coffee table and added her own gift of boxed apple juice to their unholy snack mountain made of McDonald's, sour candies, and soft sugar cookies.

Denki stared at his phone screen, fixated upon a blank text message screen with no history. This was it. He was gonna text Jirou now. _Doki-Doki Music Club, _he'd saved her number under, and _man, _was the _doki-doki_ part of that name becoming increasingly more accurate the longer he stared at his phone screen.

Mina literally crash landed on the couch, the shaking of the cushions leading Denki to shut off his phone and pocket it for the time being.

"So what are we watching today, Sero-Sero-Cellophane?" Mina asked, wriggling her way into the cuddle heap by making herself a bit of space between Denki and Kirishima. "Because if you haven't picked, might I _humbly _suggest Barbie's _The Princess and the Pauper—"_

"My dude, the Barbie movies are good and all, but—" Denki began.

"But _what,_ Denki? _What_ could possibly be wrong with more Barbie movies?" Mina challenged, crossing her arms and tapping her foot on the air.

"They're littier than titties," Kirishima added, reaching over to the coffee table and ripping himself open a bag of hot cheetos.

"Shut up, guys, we're gonna watch _Madoka_ today," Sero said, already connecting his laptop to the TV nearby. (How he managed to get up and across the room both so quickly and without anyone noticing was a bit beyond Denki's capabilities at the moment.)

Denki stood up, successfully escaping Mina's increasing pushback (and making her crash into the couch cushions with a yelp). "Hey, just because I forget which character's face goes with which name doesn't mean I forget what each face _does,"_ he said just before cramming as much of a single sugar cookie into his mouth as he possibly could.

"Which _reminds_ me," Mina said as everyone sat up (almost) properly on the couch. "How have _you_ been doing with _Kyouka_ lately, my dear Denki?"

Denki suddenly felt like a deer in headlights, a feeling that probably shouldn't have been helped along by his rabbit cheeks (but nonetheless somehow were).

"Oh, right, that's a thing!" Sero said as he hopped onto the couch with the rest of them. (Kirishima immediately rested his legs on his lap again.) "I keep on forgetting to catch up on the Discord."

"Nah, it's _fine, _Hanta," Mina said, briefly turning away from Denki to wave at the boy she was actually talking to. "Chargie's gonna tell us everything!"

Denki swallowed cartoonishly.

"Yeah, it's not like we're _trying_ to keep all these things from you," Kirishima added, notably pocketing his phone only now. "You just kind of have a really busy schedule that we respect too much to interfere with."

"Aww, guys." Sero wiped away imaginary tears. "You do so _little _for me, and yet, you deserve _so much."_

"Okay, but you didn't have to emphasize the word '_little'_ THAT much."

Denki found his hands in his pockets again, wanting to pull out his phone and get to texting Jirou without everyone, like, _watching_ him. A man deserved his privacy, did he not!? Should he do it? Should he not?

(Was all this waffling actually pointless?)

Before he knew it, Denki had his phone out again. _(Dang it,_ he thought. His self-control really was down underground, wasn't it?) But, with the actual dialogue of _Puella Magi Madoka Magica ✩ _starting up, his friends had quieted down and begun paying attention to the screen rather than each other.

He flicked his eyes around the room one last time, just to make sure, typed something out, took a deep breath, and hit _send._

[11:24 a.m.]

_**[Pikachu]: hey  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**hows ur winter beak going  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**break**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _i'm sorry  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _but  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _when did an electric rat get my number_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**oof  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**dis is kaminari**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _i'd've said electric mouse  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _bc pikachu deserves better_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**n also like**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _but anyway_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**on the 2nd day of finals week  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**remember**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _i hate to break it to you pikachu  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _but i am drawing a blank_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**:c  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**u daid u liked talking to meeeee  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**said  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**in mr aizawas office  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**when we were sorting outmusic together**_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**bakugou was there**_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**:c**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _ah  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _yeah i remember that  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _that was a pretty good day_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**anyways  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**letss start this over  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**hows break so far**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _fine  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _my cousin's dragging me around mall of america to go clothes shopping rn though  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _it's surprisingly easy to tune out the music here_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**mall of america?**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _i'm in minnesota right now_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**:0  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**:000  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**watcha doin htere**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _can you not read lol  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _visitng relatives  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _oh we jsut passed by a really cute sock vendor_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**were the socks cute or was the vendor**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _both (*—3__—)_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**I Would Like To See The Cute Sock Vendor**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _ok give me a sec_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _[file attached: 20181225_131200 .jpg ]_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**o dang he *is* cute**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _i told him you said that  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _tragically he's straight_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**rats**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _my cousin keeps asking me what i'm laughing at though  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _(__￢︿ __)_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**:3)~ :3)~ :3)~**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _what the fuck are those_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**rats rats rats**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _(¬_¬")_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**anyways**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _weirdo_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**were those…  
**__**[Pikachu]: **_…_**  
**__**[Pikachu]: **_…_**  
**__**[Pikachu]: **_…

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _what are you doing_

_**[Pikachu]: **_…_**  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**its for dramatic effect  
**__**[Pikachu]: **_…_**  
**__**[Pikachu]: **_…

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _lmao ok_

_**[Pikachu]: **_…_**  
**__**[Pikachu]: **_…_**  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**sAxOpHOnE sOcKS  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**sock guy was posing with?**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _mebbe_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**u hesitated**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _because i'm walking around a busy mall dumbass_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**that does remind me tho  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**whyd you pick saxophone**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _well it's not like the sax was my first instrument  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _my parents are musicians  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _so i've been taking piano lessons since i was four_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**:O**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _yee (^∇^*)  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _n then i started violin when i was eight  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _stopped when i was twelve tho bc i didn't really vibe w/it  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _picked up a bit of guitar from my dad over the course of existing  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _he let me mess around with his trumpet sometimes when i hit high school too_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**holy shit dude  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**is there any instrument you *cant* play?**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _i have yet to get my hands on a theremin_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**wats that**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _give me a sec  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _i know a pretty cool song that uses it_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _[insert link here]_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _it's that thing you control with your hand n stuff_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**hehehe  
**__**[Pikachu]: spacey wacey soun**__**d**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _lol yeah  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _speaking srsly tho  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _i'm only rlly competent on like  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _three or four instruments_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**but then why main alto sax**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _idk man  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _aside from it being one of my aforementioned competent instruments  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _it just kinda felt right_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**is this why mina calls the altos  
**__**[Pikachu]: **_"_**a collection of random people who all just happen to play the same instrument"**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _she calls us that?_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**.  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**sometimes**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _lol ok  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _back in middle school they said it was because we were ~saxy~  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _but ok  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _why'd /you/ pick trombone?_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**u know that one meme  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**abt the kid  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**slamming the oven door  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**n the old guy playing tbone 2 go along w it**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _you chose trombone…  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _for the memes?_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**yes**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _idk what else i expected tbh  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _back row's always acting like they're on drugs anyway_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**exqueeze me  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**in 4th grade i swore 2 never do drugs  
**__**[Pikachu]: **__**n i never go back on my ninja ways**_

_**[Pikachu]: **__**[file attached: narutos ninja ways .png]**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _brb cousin's on the move_

Obviously, Jirou didn't respond to that immediately. Denki still waited a few minutes, since there had been a few hiccups in her response times earlier, but soon enough, the second half of _Puella Magi_ _Madoka Magica_ episode one drew him in. He let his phone fall asleep on him and sank more comfortably into his friends to pay the anime the respect it deserved.

"So, Kaminari," Sero said as the end credits began to roll, a sly grin upon his face. "What's the deal with you and Head Drum Major Jirou?"

Denki reached for a juice box and stabbed it with the provided straw. He took a lengthy sip as his friends one by one wriggled into a position to stare at him, some more expectant than others. (For example, Kirishima seemed _far_ more invested in his own phone screen than anything Denki was about to say.)

"Ah~" said the blond boy when he finished the tiny box. (He tried throwing it into the waste basket Sero had dragged into the room for the occasion, but didn't _quite_ make it in.)

"She's my soulmate," he casually said as he shuffled over to properly dispose of his juice box. "I tried asking her to Homecoming, but she said no, so now I'm trying to become friends with her first because Mina said so."

"_She's_ your _soulmate?"_ Sero half-shouted, quickly hitting pause on the next episode of _Madoka_ that had automatically begun to play. "Holy _shit, _dude! How'd you find out?"

"Through a series of shenanigans involving my trombone and Kirishima's baritone," Denki impatiently responded, literally waving Sero's concerns off with an absentminded flick of the wrist. "Look, the point is, I got her _number_ like, a week ago or something, and—"

"Ohhh, is _that_ why you've been looking at your phone instead of the TV this whole time?" Mina grinned, her eyes starting to sparkle as she stood up.

"Hey, I'm still watching the show!" Denki said, backing up a few paces and putting his hands up in the air. "_I_ don't need the subs that badly!"

"Shut up! I have ADHD!" Kirishima mumble-shouted, his fingers flying on his own phone keyboard. "And also no Japanese skills."

Sero sighed louder than anyone else was talking and said, "Guys, can't we just be happy for the man? He got a girl's _phone number!"_

"True," Mina said, flopping back onto the couch.

"He's doing better than _you,"_ Kirishima added, his eyes _still_ glued to his phone.

"Hey!" Sero swiped up a pack of candy and chucked it at the redhead's face. "_You're_ one to talk!"

"I'm _gay,_ Sero!" Kirishima finally put away his phone, if only to dig into the candy Sero had shot at him.

"He's _gay,_ Hanta!" Mina echoed, ripping open a pack of candy, throwing her head back, and chucking all of it into her mouth at once.

"You think I don't _know_ that? His Discord name was _literally_ KiriGay for a _year!"_

"You guys _know_ what he means," Denki said, deciding that it was his turn to play conflict mediator. He popped open a box of McNuggets and began popping them into his mouth. "So, Kirishima, did you get the number of any boys _you're _interested in?"

Kirishima sat up properly and grinned. "I got Bakugou's!" he chirruped, triumphantly holding up his phone.

"_YOOO,_ you mean the _other_ drum major?" Sero shouted. "When did you start liking _him?"_

_(Oh, dang, Sero really _is _out of the loop,_ Denki thought.)

"And _when_ did you get his _number?"_ Mina cried, repeatedly smacking the couch in frustration.

Kirishima swallowed the last of his candy. "Uhhh, at the Shiketsu game, and like… _three_ weeks ago? Maybe four. I don't really remember right now."

Sero sat back and crossed his arms. "Shiketsu game," he said. He spoke at a normal, human, indoor volume, which is to say that compared to all the rest of them, it sounded like he was muttering under his breath. "Oh, is that why he sat with us at the winter concert?"

"Uhhh, _yeah!"_ Kirishima said. "I just kind of figured it would be a good idea to incorporate him into our squad more often, kinda."

"Oh, dude!" Mina began bouncing up and down on the couch. "Do you think he'd let us crash at his place, like, right now?"

"Yo, dude, don't you think that's kind of short notice?" Sero asked. "And how would we even get there? Do you even know where he lives, Kiri?"

"Dude, you can _drive!"_ Denki said, gesturing furiously at the other boy. "Yeah, you drive a soccer mom car, but _you _can _drive!"_

"And I can just _ask_ him where he lives," Kirishima added.

"Woohoo! Party at Bakugou's place!" Mina cheered. She launched herself up in the air from the couch and crashed right back down into a giggly heap.

"The question _now_ is," said Sero (who was very hard to look directly at because now Mina had wriggled her way right behind him and began doing a thing with her eyebrows), "will he say _yes?"_

Denki grinned. "Oh," he said, swallowing a chicken nugget whole and only regretting that decision a _little _bit, "I think you'd be surprised."

* * *

**_Author's Note xii._**_ hello. back after a week of break. chances are, i'm finished writing this arc by the time i post this on friday, which is a hella astonishing thing to think about. this is called the kegger arc, by the way, because, well. they're at smth they call a kegger. anyway, figuring out the chronological order for this arc was a bit messy, since it has a lot of overlap with its chapter counterparts in _rhythm, _but hey it's been worked out. if you read rhythm, you'll find that the stories overlap in places, which i find pretty fun. _

_anyway, follow me on tumblr (**a-piece-of-shipping-trash**) to listen to me talk about whatever. i talk a lot about this au. i also livestream myself writing fic or doing other fandom activities on friday evenings on picarto, and i announce stuff like that, again, on my tumblr. _

_follow/fave if you're new, leave a review bc VIBE RECEIVER BROKE i need you guys to tell me what you're thinking to my face, and stay safe out there_

* * *

**Next Chronologically: **Rhythm 7 / Moment 16 | Moment 14


	13. Francis Forever

**Previous Chronologically: **Rhythm 8 / Moment 8

* * *

**Word Count: **2,257

* * *

Kyouka had never cared too deeply about what the band members from the sister schools said or did. Really! She didn't! Shiketsu and Ketsubutsu were just _whatever _in her head. She didn't care what they did. She didn't care what they thought. It didn't bother her when they came to visit UA; it didn't bother her when UA went to visit them.

So _why_ was it so hard to ignore them _now, _at the triband collaboration?

Kyouka could lowkey feel an anime anger mark rising up to her forehead as she desperately tried to pretend that Shindou _wasn't_ secretly laughing at her to Shiketsu's head drum major, some guy with a stick up his ass named Shishikura, who seemed to be regarding her very existence some breach of etiquette, judging by the disdainful looks he was constantly sending her way.

She simply tightened her grip on her baton, desperately trying to ignore the little voice inside her head telling her to fuck the laws of the land, just whack 'em both with her stick. Because no, this stick wasn't made for whacking people. She knew that.

(Some part of her still wished she'd taken Bakugou's mace down instead, though.)

"Kyouka?" a familiar voice asked.

Kyouka jumped, making a sound that was about seventy percent swear word, thirty percent pure surprise. She did a perfect about hace and found herself face-to-face with a very concerned-looking Momo. (Who also looked very apologetic, but honestly, when did Yaomomo _not_ look apologetic?)

"Oh, Yaomomo," Kyouka said. She absently twirled her baton around in an attempt to look productive to poorly disguise the fact that she _really_ needed it to calm her nerves. "Something up with your sectionals? Need me to come intervene in some gossip ring that's gotten out of hand or something?"

Momo shook her head and folded her arms across her chest. "No, we're just on a quick water break right now."

"Oh," said Kyouka. She looked beyond Momo to see the circle of flutes.

Half of them were seated, and most of them appeared to be making mere idle chatter between the swigs of water. Normal flute-y business as usual.

Briefly, Kyouka wondered why she couldn't hear why she couldn't hear any instrument in particular playing in her head. She was, after all, at least _aware_ of the fact that her soulmate was somewhere in the band. Why wasn't she trying harder to find them? It would make sense for them to be at the triband collaboration. Mr. Aizawa made sure that their performance tonight would influence his grading later on. (Was that legal? She wasn't sure.)

But then, she decided she didn't actually care— about the soulmate thing anyway— at least, not at the moment. There were some idiotic trombones dicking around under what she could only assume was Kaminari's lead; she figured she should probably march on over to them for a good, quick chiding.

(Eyeing her rival drum majors, she knew it would be a good idea to exercise her authority.)

But she didn't. For her own reasons.

Kyouka instead turned her gaze up at the bleachers, where the three schools' band directors proudly surveyed over the two hundred something dumb teen musicians supposedly practicing out on UA's football field like they were Mufasa on Pride Rock observing everything the light touched as their kingdom or something. Although, it _was _getting to be late in the afternoon, so the light wasn't exactly touching much anymore, and—

"Kyouka, are you okay?" Momo asked. Her tone was merely inquisitive; there was neither judgement nor overbearing concern present in her simple question.

"Yeah, I'm fine," Kyouka answered. She turned to face her best friend again, still playing with her baton, and cocked her head. "Why do you ask?"

Momo shrugged.

"Intuition," she said.

Kyouka tossed her baton up in the air, caught it, and spun it around for a few more trick shots before firmly planting one end back into the shitty fake turf. "Well, it's just another field show," she said, leaning her weight against her baton.

"And you're satisfied with where we are?"

Kyouka stared at Momo, at a loss for words.

"Are you saying I _shouldn't_ be?"

"_No,"_ Momo said, tilting her head to match Kyouka's angle. "I'm just worried you don't think we measure up."

She finished speaking there, but Kyouka still knew what she was referring to.

Kyouka sucked at her bottom lip, wishing she had a reed on her. She cast her eyes up at the bleachers again, past the teachers to the entrance walkway where a bubbly blue head was bouncing in to watch, her dark-haired shadow slipping in behind her as though it felt it needed the sun to fully exist.

"Does it matter?" she asked.

* * *

Someone punched her right between the shoulder blades.

"What do you want, Kouta?" Kyouka asked, doing her best to pretend she hadn't been caught off-guard.

"Where's Deku," the twelve-year-old gruffly demanded.

Kyouka sighed and turned around to face the kid, aggressively ignoring Shindou's heckling from three yards away. (She was already _well_ aware of the fact that she was barely taller than a twelve-year-old, thank you very much.) "With the flutes," she told him, a little exasperated.

"Where are they," Kouta demanded in the same dead, false-gruff voice.

Kyouka pointed him in the right direction, wondering if she made the right decision when Kouta lowered his head and charged headfirst into Midoriya's backside.

"You shouldn't encourage that kind of behavior, Jirou."

Kyouka jumped, almost dropping her baton in surprise. Whipping around, she found Mr. Aizawa looming over her, disapproval written all over his face.

"Y-you surprised me there, Mr. Aizawa," she stammered, terrified that he was going to scold her for not doing more. Then she realized she wasn't at attention and scrambled to posture properly without making a fool of herself.

Mr. Aizawa made some noise that was halfway between a grunt and a hum, sounding oddly like a cat. "Drop that baton and it's five push-ups for you," he said.

Kyouka found herself relaxing, but only internally. "Yes, I _know,"_ she said. _What's he really down here for?_

"People are starting to gather in the stands," Mr. Aizawa blandly said, flicking his head in the appropriate direction. "Bring everyone in and block it up on the track in the next five minutes."

Kyouka tried not to let her suspicious surprise show on her face. _Was that really it?_ she thought. What she said instead, however, was a curt and simple, "Yes, sir."

Mr. Aizawa made another cattish noise of acknowledgement and turned around.

"And by the way," he said. "The other schools' faculty is impressed by your performance. Keep up the good work."

Kyouka couldn't help herself: she broke attention.

Smiling broadly, filled with that rare joy of genuinely needed encouragement, she said, "_Yessir!"_

"Now hurry up and call your band over."

Kyouka turned around to face the majority of the field and blew her whistle loud and long.

"_UA!" _she shouted, her voice echoing across the field. "_Bring it in!"_

* * *

Kyouka cracked her knuckles and hoped no one noticed her shifting around on the drum major's platform. They were the first band to perform tonight, so the audience was still restless and only half filled out.

She could hardly hear the announcer begin his introduction. Maybe it was the fact that she was so close to the field; maybe she was simply dissociating. All she could really catch was _something something something UA, performing something something something. _She didn't even hear her own _name_ announced, but she knew when to salute the audience just by judging the strength of their cheers.

She turned around, searching the yard lines for Bakugou as she pulled at the hem of her gloves one last time. She put her hands up to begin, nodded at the snare drum, and the show began.

* * *

The field lights were almost blindingly bright, if you stared straight at them for too long. _Almost. _

Kyouka brought her fists down to her side as the night ended as it began: with an announcer chattering away into a microphone she could hardly hear, and the inescapable impression of all eyes on her. Now that the collaboration pieces had been played and every musician had been exhausted, the second the announcer thanked the audience and bade them good night, this year's field show season would be over.

She squinted up at the night sky, only half an ear dedicated to anything but the whistling of the cool, November breeze. All the stars were blocked out thanks to the bright field lights, but there was something sobering about an empty, blue-black sky devoid of anything but the void.

Kyouka snorted to herself, her lip twitching in a way that begged her to smile in a way she was just too exhausted for at the moment. She wished it was cold enough for her to see her breath tonight. There was always something wonderful about seeing your own breath before you.

Mina was the first to tackle her out of her thoughts. Literally.

"Hey, hey!" the pit player cried, rattling Kyouka all around with her death grip hug and excited bouncing. "How was _that_ for a performance? Tooru and I absolutely _nailed_ those runs, and all the Ketsubutsu kids were like, '_ooo,'_ I could see it in their eyes and everything, and you looked _so cool_ conducting us tonight, like…"

Kyouka struggled to reorient herself in space and time as Mina babbled on. Pretty soon, the rest of her bandmates began closing in on her, a dozen or more voices each individually clamoring for a speech! A speech! Give them a _speech!_

Kyouka wrestled her way out of Mina's grip and hopped onto one of the benches on the sidelines to stand above the rest.

"I'm very proud of everyone's performances tonight," she began, each word bringing her mind back down to earth a little bit more. "Seniors, this was your last time on the field as a part of the UA band. You've all done excellent work as senpai to the first and second years."

She clasped her hands in front of her and bowed. "Thank you so much for your hard work!"

There was a mix of cheers and excited, teenage boy hooting, with one or two first year band members echoing her sentiments, as she stood up straight again. (There was also someone scoffing right behind her, but what she didn't see didn't matter to her right now.)

"Juniors, this is where we begin to take up the mantles of those before us," Kyouka continued, quieting everyone with the power she put into her voice and her words. "Freshmen, sophomores— I know your time may seem a long way off, but remember that anything can happen between now and even next semester."

She paused to gather herself, although judging by the cheers, everyone else probably thought she was jsut being dramatic. "Remember the hard work that brought us here. Remember everything we've done as a band, whether with just us, or in collaboration with the other schools. And finally, remember…"

_("Say the line! Say it, say it, say it!")_

"We still have more than a full year's worth of work before the Rose Parade next year!" Several dozens of teenage boys simultaneously cried out in disappointment. Kyouka fought the urge to roll her eyes (but lost to the one that made her grin).

"So put your hearts into it!" she shouted, wishing she'd had the time to grab her baton before she'd been cornered into giving the speech. It would have been so cool to raise it up right now. "And we'll look _stellar!"_

The UA band erupted into cheers.

Kyouka hopped off the bench to a sea of strong pats, shakes, and cheers. Surrounded by friends and the pressure of leading everyone now off her shoulders, she allowed herself to laugh.

* * *

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The voice came from behind her.

"Jirou."

Kyouka turned around. "Mr. Aizawa," she said, feeling sassy.

"I was talking with the other band directors just now about the last performance," Mr. Aizawa said. "It's hard to keep multiple conductors in sync with as little collaboration as we've had or planned, so for the Rose Parade, we might pick only one drum major to lead the whole district band."

The words weren't quite sinking in for Kyouka. "Uh, okay?" she said. "That makes sense."

"We'll know for sure by the end of February," Mr. Aizawa continued. "Make sure to keep working hard until then."

As suddenly as he appeared, Mr. Aizawa was gone.

And just like that, Kyouka was hit with the weight of his meaning.

"Oh," she said to herself. She blinked rapidly, as if that would speed up her processing power, and looked around at everyone else having fun hanging out on the field for some good ol' post-performance socializing with not only the other schools, but the alumni that came to watch and reminisce.

She looked up at the sky, still empty thanks to the bright field lights, and wondered where the waning moon was.

"Oh," she said.

* * *

_**Author's Note xiii. **__ahahaha it's been a busy week for me. i've now moved into an apartment closer to school even though thanks to the Plague(tm) it should all be online, and i've been running around having (masked and socially distanced) adventures with the first of my three other roommates to come down. iiiiiiiiii'm trying to write a kmjr oneshot, though as you might be able to gather, i've been a bit short on writing time lately, but it's meant to be a fun oneshot! i've been wanting to write a plain kmjr oneshot outside of this au for a while now, and this is gonna be a good opportunity for that so. i guess maybe keep an eye out for that? C:_

_anyway, i chose the song "Francis Forever" by mitski for this chapter's title because idk a lot of the mitski songs i stumbled upon when naming chapters for this au tended to be melancholy, and the impression francis forever gave me was one of like. someone that was supposed to be there in the audience, but wasn't for just Reasons. and if you'll recall earlier on in the fic, jirou was putting a lot of pressure on herself to do well, and now you have this triband collab, it's supposed to be the last of field show season. she should be allowed to chill after this. but now aizawa's putting the pressure of the rose parade, which is Big Deal (doesn't feel like it outside of band but just trust me on this in that some people do make a big deal out of this) because now you're on TV, you're being recorded basically for history as part of the new year's celebration, aaaand she might just be at the very front of that. and that's Pressure, and she kind of feels deep down that she needs guidance, but her one role model (mirio, whom i always feel like i should write into the fic more but just have no opportunities to do so) just still isn't fully available to her. uhh tl;dr it Vibes._

_anyway wheeee streaming on picarto friday evenings still, under the same username (huafeihua). follow me on tumblr (**a-piece-of-shipping-trash**) to get the links and know when i'm streaming and stuff, chat with me about the au or just hang out with me! it's fun i promise. follow/fave/review if that's what you're into, thank you for reading, and stay safe out there_

* * *

**Next Chronologically: **Moment 9 | Rhythm 1


	14. Never Look Away

**Previous Chronologically:** Rhythm 7 / Moment 12

* * *

**Word Count: **2,609

* * *

[6:18 p.m]

_[Pikachu]:_ _anyways  
__[Pikachu]:_ _r u looking forward to the rose parade next yr  
__[Pikachu]:_ _everyones p certain ur gonna b leading the triband  
__[Pikachu]:_ _thats gotta b pretty cool  
__[Pikachu]:_ _*finger guns*_

_**[Doki-Doki Music Club]: hang on it's time for dinner**_

* * *

That was a lie. Dinner wouldn't be ready for at least another hour.

Kyouka shut off her phone, closed her eyes, and took a deep breath, careful to keep it steady.

(What was she feeling right now? She couldn't quite place where they came from or where they lived inside her.)

It was like… she was _nervous._

But about what? The very _thought_ of the Rose Parade?

She put a hand to her chest, breathing in time with the strong beating of her heart. It felt like sparks of electricity were flying out of her with every exhale, making her hair do that little Ghibli poof every time. She did this until her pulse was slow and steady again, although the practice left her feeling a little light-headed.

She pulled her phone from the charger in the wall and stood up, only half-hearing the constant chattering of her relatives in the kitchen down the hall. This house was so much stuffier than she could take; it was like she could hardly take in any real breath.

She walked down a set of stairs to the tiny foyer, picked out her winter coat, and pocketed her phone.

"_I'm going outside,"_ she said as she passed her aunt and mother by. She briefly paused when she reached the glass sliding door leading into the backyard, then realized she forgot to grab her shoes. With an unsatisfying sigh, she crossed the tiny house to fetch them.

Her aunt laughed a little, possibly at her choice of words, possibly at her forgetfulness. "_Have a safe trip,"_ she teased, her Japanese so much prettier-sounding than Kyouka's own.

Kyouka said nothing, the breezy, light-headed nervousness taking over her mind until the cold, winter air knocked it all out of her.

"_Haaaaaaah~"_ She let it all out with a sigh. She watched her breath fog up before her, blowing a few snowflakes out of her face. Her bare fingers curled instinctively, trying to protect her from the chill of the night, but it was hard to do that when they also stiffened so easily.

(She shoved her hands into their opposite sleeves to leech warmth off her own forearms.)

She took a few steps around her aunt's porch, the sharp _crunch-crushing_ of the snow hitting her ears at an impossibly loud volume. It kept her from thinking too hard, but that wasn't exactly a _bad_ thing in her books.

She lifted her face to the sky, only to feel a sort of numbed disappointment at its appearance. The house lights tinged the grey-black clouds with warm yellow light from her perspective, and she found herself missing the few stars she could see from back home.

She looked back down at her feet and took a few steps around the porch again.

_Maybe I should walk down to the lake,_ she thought. It was hard to spot in the dark, especially without any moon, but it wasn't _far_ or anything. The shore was hardly three feet past the edge of her cousins' property.

She let out a dragon's breath again, staring at it fade out until her eyes stung.

If she'd bothered to pay attention to her thoughts, they'd at least be clearer by now, but there was so much she'd rather not think about. Chatting with Kaminari for most of the day _was_ a lot of fun. She'd laughed so much that she'd lost count before even leaving the mall.

But it was weird.

She briefly pulled her hands out of her sleeves and breathed onto them for a second. Then, she tucked them away again and stared off into the horizon, at the distant houses on the other side of the lake, all brightly lit in a rainbow of colors.

She couldn't quite place why, but her happiness felt _weird._

She watched the snowflakes fall, enamored by how well she could see the detail on each one. She couldn't remember the last time she had _watched_ it snow— most of the time, it was already there on the ground when she arrived in the mountains or Minnesota.

Breaking the perfect silence of the outside, her phone began to play a familiar piano tune.

Kyouka swore. Tearing her hands out of their cozy places, she fumbled with all her pockets as she tried to simultaneously dig out her phone and track down her earbuds.

She answered the phone just before the call went to voicemail.

"Hey, Yaomomo," she said, still using her free hand to pat herself down in search of the elusive earbuds. "What's up?"

"_You sound different,"_ Momo commented. "_Is the signal bad up there?"_

"No, just give me a sec." Kyouka pressed her phone up against her ear using her shoulder as fished out her earbuds and quickly untangled them. Plugging them in, she said, "How's this?"

"_Yup! There you are."_

"So," said Kyouka as she zipped up her outer jacket again. "What's up?"

"_Mmm, nothing much. Went to the park with Shoto earlier and played for the pigeons."_ Momo giggled, and Kyouka couldn't help but smile. "_They really seemed to like _Sleigh Bells."

"Did Todoroki _finally_ nail his horse impression?"

"_Nope." _Both girls laughed again.

"Good to _know,_ good to know," Kyouka said, brushing some snow off the porch railing with her elbow.

"_What?"_

"That there's something Todoroki-_trumpet-prodigy_-Shoto can't pull off on his instrument." She leaned against the now snow-free railing and stared at the twinkling house lights in the distance.

"_I've been telling you for years now, he's not a god."_

"Years?" Kyouka paused to think about it for a bit. _(That didn't sound quite right…)_

"_Well, months,"_ Momo admitted. "_But it feels like years."_

Kyouka blinked a few times. It felt more like mere weeks to her: her life as of late was full of days that all blended together. The triband collaboration felt like last week. Homecoming couldn't have been more than a month ago, and yet—

"_I guess that's just what happens when you find your soulmate,"_ Momo continued, her voice dreamy and thoughtful all at once. "_Time just passes differently."_

Kyouka instinctually clenched her jaw for a moment before forcing herself to relax.

"_Anyway, how have you been, Kyouka? Do anything fun today?"_

"Ahh, I went to the mall with my cousins," she said. "Kaminari _randomly _started texting me about halfway through. That was surprisingly fun."

On the other side of the line, Momo started laughing.

Kyouka frowned and glared at the ground. "What? What's so funny?" she demanded.

"_It's just… it's so different than the time back in October when he ran up to you and _randomly _asked you to Homecoming,"_ Momo replied.

Kyouka felt her cheeks puff up with indignance. "Well, that was different!" she said. "I didn't know him as much back then! I thought he was just some random weirdo!"

"_So he's not a random weirdo anymore?"_

"Well, he's definitely still a _weirdo._ A _harmless _weirdo, sure, but still a weirdo," Kyouka said, waving her hand despite having no audience. "But I guess…"

She trailed off, distracted by a funny feeling behind her ribs. (Momo, patient as ever, waited for her to continue.)

"I guess we're friends now," she said.

There was a long silence between the two of them.

"_Did you ask him about Homecoming?"_ Momo asked.

"No," Kyouka immediately replied. She paused, rested her cheek on her palm, and repeated herself, slower this time:

"No. I— I didn't."

"_You'll never know if you don't ask, Kyo,"_ Momo reminded her. "_You can't just go around expecting everyone to read your mind and act accordingly."_

"I know."

"_You can't just be dropping hints all the time. You've got to be explicit, or else who will ever understand what you mean? Yourself?"_ The other side of the line crackled as something rustled behind the scenes.

"I know, Momo." (Kyouka bit back a sigh.)

"_Kyouka,"_ said Momo. Her voice was laced with a gentle tiredness that reminded Kyouka of a loving mother.

"Yeah?"

"_I love you."_

"I love you too, Yaomomo." Kyouka played with her earbud wires, tempted to pull one out of her ear so she could spin it around.

"_Why don't you just ask him?"_

This time, Kyouka could not hold back her sigh.

She ragdolled against the railing, ignoring the seeping cold as she stared at the ground far below for what felt like forever. For a while, she simply allowed the snowflakes to gather in her hair. (Her chest ached.)

"I'm scared," she said at last. Quietly, because she hoped the mic wouldn't pick up her voice and she'd be able to change the subject when her best friend asked her to repeat herself.

"_Of what?"_

Kyouka dragged herself back into an upright position and brought the mic close to her lips. Yet, despite opening her mouth and going through the motions, words did not come out.

She cracked her knuckles, the sound sharp, yet soothing. She wished Momo was physically with her right then; she'd always been better at signing her feelings than saying them aloud.

But she wasn't there, _couldn't_ be there with her, so Kyouka picked the only other language she knew.

"_I don't know," _she said. Switching to Japanese, the words came out more easily, since it was easier to make them dance around her real meanings. "_I guess I don't want to ruin what we already have."_

"_**Kyou-chan,"**_ said Momo, switching languages accordingly. "_**You make it sound like there's something going on between you two."**_

"_Well, we _are _friends,"_ Kyouka argued.

"_**Something unspoken."**_

"_Technically, there is."_

"_**Something **_**you** _**refuse to talk or ask about."**_

"_That merely means that I'm the one in control of the information, then."_

"_**Are you afraid that he likes you?"**_

Kyouka froze. (The earbud wire slipped out from between her fingers.)

"No!" she said, her jaw and cheeks burning with heat against the frigid, snowy night wind.

"_Then are you afraid that you might like him?"_

Kyouka clenched her jaw again. (Momo always had this way of silencing a classroom with one harsh truth.) Everything hurt right now— her fingers, her nose, her ears— everything stung, and she didn't want to think about it.

"We're friends," she said weakly. She sniffled a bit; her nose was running from the cold.

"_That doesn't always stop feelings,"_ Momo said. "_In fact, in most cases, people are friends before they try to pursue a romantic relationship with someone."_

Kyouka laughed, suddenly feeling light and warm and happy. "Yes, I _know,_ Momo, because _you_ were _such_ an _exemplary_ case of '_becoming friends with someone before getting with them',"_ she said.

Momo huffed on the other side of the line. "_Well, it's working out just fine for me!"_

"That's because Todoroki is a _pretty_ boy." Kyouka emphasized the word "_pretty"_ so much, she practically _sang_ it.

Momo made more noises of embarrassed indignation as Kyouka cackled.

"_Kyouka,"_ Momo said, and the mood suddenly took a slight dip.

"Yeah?" Kyouka replied, still holding onto her smile.

"_Are you scared of people liking you the way you are?"_

"What makes you say that?"

"_You're always talking about how you're not good enough."_

"And _whaaaat_ makes you say that?"

"_Please. I _know _what self-doubt sounds like."_

Kyouka stood up straight, shook out her arms, and warmed up her hands with her breath again. "It's not that I _doubt_ myself, dude. I'm just looking at it objectively."

"_Then why don't you look at Kaminari and ask _him _objectively, 'Why did you ask _me _in particular to Homecoming?'" _Momo challenged.

Kyouka cracked her knuckles again, her fingers growing red and sore from their prolonged exposure. "Geez, Momo, when did you become so straightforward?"

"_I don't know. I'd say you rubbed off on me over the years, but…"_

Kyouka snorted, the irony not lost on her. The air parched her throat, but the feeling cleared her lungs, so the effects on her were just about even. "I guess I should toughen up again, huh?"

"_You're gonna be on national television in a year, so I think bravery is something you could start practicing now, yes."_

"You are too!" Kyouka kicked a bit of snow off the porch, grinning.

"_I'm not going to be the one leading up front."_

"I don't know why you and everyone else keeps insisting _I'm_ gonna be the one up front," Kyouka loftily replied, still scraping her foot around in the snow.

"_Because you're _good _at leading the band, Kyouka. I and everyone else genuinely believe that _you _are the most solid choice here,"_ Momo said. "_I don't know why _you _keep insisting that you're not."_

Kyouka hummed noncommittally. "Because I'm _noooot~"_ she sing-songed for a bit, then let her joking guise drop. "Look, UA's not the only band here. You know that. Shiketsu and Ketsubutsu have their _own_ drum majors, and even _if_ they're both kind of assholes, they're not _bad_ at what they do! Besides, I'm the youngest. It would be unprofessional and rude to the senpai who have worked for so much longer to choose me."

"_You're the only one not graduating before the Rose Parade."_

"_Pssh,_ they'll probably come back for rehearsals."

"_Maybe they will. That's a lot to be committing to. There's no guarantee that they can make it, and I don't think admin would like it if the directors gambled on the _drum major _showing up to rehearsals."_

The door behind Kyouka slid open.

"Kyouka, come inside and warm up before dinner!" her mother called. "You're going to freeze to death out here!"

"Okaaaay!" Kyouka called over her shoulder. "I'll be inside in a minute!"

She returned to her call as the door closed behind her again. "See? Gotta go now, Yaomomo. I'll text you later~"

Momo sighed on the other side of the line. "_I don't think you should be so dismissive, Kyouka. At least consider it as a possibility, and if it happens, then you're prepared. If not, then it's not like you lose anything."_

"Mhm." Kyouka knew there were a lot of situations she could apply that advice to, but this was her winter break. She'd rather not think about it. "I'll keep that in mind. Buh-byeee~"

"_Mhm."_

Kyouka was the one who hung up first, but her smile faltered when she heard the tone anyway. She looked up at the sky again, blew at the snowflakes floating down on her face as she pocketed her phone again.

Somehow, everyone and everything she knew just felt so far away right now.

A song began playing in her head right as she finally began readying herself to enter the house again. It was far from the first time this particular one had come on today; perhaps her soulmate was binge watching an anime or something?

(Oh, what did it matter?)

She hummed along.

* * *

**_Author's Note xiv. _**_i love this chapter so much. just. it's so chill. and yet also kind of not. or maybe it just doesn't feel that way to me because i have more context on what happens. by the way, speaking of knowing what happens, i straight up thought i was gonna get murdered like almost a week ago bc my roommate n i have been getting our doorbell rung way late at night, so if you traverse the #Bb-spoilers tag on my tumblr (**a-piece-of-shipping-trash**) you can in fact find my entire outline for this au because even if i die, i am NOT leaving you guys hanging. even though i'm pretty sure almost no one's reading on this site (it's fine i've come to terms with the fact that my audience is on ao3). _

_anyway, my fave part of this chapter is probably the "i love you" btwn momo n jirou bc like. if you don't tell your friends you love them sometimes idk what to tell you. as a grey-aro, i can tell you that platonic love is fun and real and you should say it. also because my ships can have a little bit of gay. as a treat. _

_i chose "never look away" by vienna teng for this chapter's title for two reasons. the first one is basically bc it feels kind of like how momo's always telling jirou to face kaminari and ask him to his face what he's up to, to not look away from what she's afraid of. the other one is kind of a spoilery reason that isn't a spoiler if you're coming to this after the whole fic is completed and are reading this in chronological order (coughs on chapter 25). _

_that's all for this time around. thank you for reading, follow/fave if you're new n curious, leave a review, and stay safe out there_

* * *

**Happening Concurrently: **Moment 16**  
Next Chronologically:** Moment 35


	15. Sports

**Previous Chronologically: **Moment 35

* * *

**Word Count: **5,782

* * *

It always was weird how, the _second_ school began again, two whole weeks of winter break would inevitably feel as though they had never happened at all. All those wonderful winter memories were out of sight and out of mind; it was time again to return to the regular old grind. (Junior year, amirite?)

Kyouka frowned at her trig homework and ran a hand through her hair, thoroughly stumped. "Oi, Bakugou, how do you—" she began, but her phone vibrated at that exact moment, interrupting her with a Discord notification.

Bakugou, the only other student in the band room, paused his own calculus homework to send a questioning look anyway, but Kyouka waved him off, secretly grateful for the distraction.

**Discord **[2:56 p.m.] - **_Chargebolt  
_**hey are u in the band room rn

Kyouka ignored Bakugou's irritated snort as she lay her pencil aside and unlocked her phone with a smile.

**Chargebolt:  
**_[2:56] | _hey are u in the band room rn

**Earphone Jack:  
**_[2:57] | _yeah

**Chargebolt:  
**_[2:57] | _cool can i hang out in there w u until call time

Kyouka made a little noise at her phone screen, a little caught off-guard by his request. _But,_ she supposed, _no harm in humoring him._

**Earphone Jack:  
**_[2:57] | _uhh sure  
_[2:58] | _why tho

(The last bell of the school day rang.)

**Chargebolt:  
**_[2:58] | _well u see  
_[2:58] |_ usually mina likes to have us all go out 2 dinner b4 games n stuff bc this squad is a FAMILY  
_[2:58] | _but todays off the table bc shes got choreo practice, seros got a cold, n kiris got a Date™

_Ah,_ Kyouka thought, empathizing immediately with that last one. (She glanced up from her phone to subtly shake her head at Bakugou.) How many times had she chosen to stay in the band room by herself to avoid third wheeling Yaomomo and her boyfriend? _Way _too many times for _her _tastes, that's how many.

**Earphone Jack:  
**_[2:59] | _yeah  
_[2:59] | _you know what, yeah  
_[2:59] | _you can hang out here

**Chargebolt:  
**_[2:59] | _great!  
_[3:00] | _bc…

Kyouka barely had a moment to make a confuzzled face at her phone when the band room doors swung open, and in sauntered the blond dumbass himself (with his redheaded sidekick in tow, of course).

"I am here!" Kaminari rumbled in as low a voice he could muster. It was, speaking frankly, a rather _dinky _impression of the band director before Mr. Aizawa, but Kyouka slapped a hand over her mouth anyway to keep herself from spitting with laughter, slamming her phone down on the table almost on sheer instinct.

"Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey, Bakugou!" Kirishima said, cheerfully bonking Bakugou on the head with every _"__Hey!"_ that popped out of his mouth, "Hey, Bakugou! Let's go to Toyomitsu's today! I've been thinking about their sandwiches _all._ _Day."_

Bakugou flicked his pencil up at his fake boyfriend (probably almost putting out at least _one_ of their eyes in the process) and while he had Kirishima distracted, shut his math notebook and shoved it into his backpack. "All right, all _right!"_ he said, half-assedly zipping up his bag and slinging it over one shoulder as he stood up. "Let's go to the fuckin' deli today."

"Have a good trip~!" Kaminari chirped, jumping up to sit atop the table Kyouka was working at. "And bring me back some of your leftovers, too!"

"Kaminari, I swear to god, if you fart on my math homework—" Kyouka said, but her words were lost to the high five Kaminari and Kirishima exchanged before the latter left with his date.

Bakugou nodded at her before he walked out the door. "Have fun with your fuckin' triangles," he said.

"Ha-ha," Kyouka said. She rolled her eyes at him, but the door was already shut, leaving the big, dim band room with only herself and Kaminari. (And Mr. Aizawa in his office, of course, but the light was off in there, so he was probably taking another one of his old man naps.)

The sudden silence was _crushing._

(And it was _weird_ and alienating as well, since normally if she weren't practicing her heart out herself, her soulmate would be blasting something into both their heads anyway.)

As Kyouka picked up her pencil to return to work again, Kaminari whirled around so that he now faced her, the usual slaphappy grin plastered upon his face.

"So, Miss Jirou," he said. "Miss _Head Drum Major." _He did a thing with his eyebrows, and Kyouka had to fight to keep a straight face. "What brings you to the UA band room on this fine January afternoon? Surely someone like _you_ would usually have… _someone… _with whom to keep company, no? Other than me, of course."

"Well, you certainly _are_ company, although whether or not you're _good_ company, now…" Kyouka pretended to think about it for a second, tapping her eraser against her chin for extra effect.

Kaminari pouted at her. "Well, now if the only company you can manage to get is bad company, then I dare say, _what does that say about you now, _hmm?" He rested his chin on his hands, leaning down so that his elbows dug into his legs and his face was on the same level as her own.

"I'll have you know, _Mister_ Kaminari," she said, twirling her pencil between her fingers for a moment before pointing its eraser right at him, "that I _did, _in fact, have invitation to spend my time this afternoon with better company than some silly, blond trombone player."

Kaminari suddenly dropped the bouncy doofus act. "Oh, really? Then, like, what are you doing here just…" He gestured vaguely to her homework. "Y'know."

Kyouka lowered her pencil and started grinding its tip against the table. "Well," she began, not sure whether to be looking at the pencil or at Kaminari, "I'm not exactly a fan of third wheeling. For as nice and as smart as Yaomomo is, she's still a bit naïve." She broke her pencil tip and stared straight at the boy sitting on the table.

_"__Ah,"_ Kaminari delicately said. He sat up straight, scooched back a bit, and hopped off the table's surface and onto the seat of the chair right across from her. _"__Wakarimasu."_

Kyouka pulled a pencil sharpener out of her backpack, stood up, and walked over to the trash can by the door. "How's the self-study going?" she asked him, the question echoing all around the empty room.

"Ehhh~" he dragged out the sound, and when she looked over her shoulder to see what he was doing, she saw him making a _so-so_ type gesture with both his head and his hands. "It's fine. I'm doing all right, I guess. So, I'm guessing there's not really anyone out there to be your go-to backup hangout guy; am I right?"

_What the hell is he trying to do? _Kyouka dumped out her pencil shavings, tested the pencil tip, and turned around to point its newly-sharpened end at him. "What are you getting at?" she asked, suddenly a little annoyed with this conversation.

Immediately, Kaminari's eyes grew so wide, she could easily see all of his golden irises from where she stood. Pink colored his pale cheeks, and he looked away. "Sorry," he said, at least having the decency to sound embarrassed about it.

Kyouka set her jaw, holding her position for a few extra seconds, then lowered the pencil and returned to their table.

"I was just curious, you know? Since you always seem to be hanging out with someone," he continued, looking up to meet her gaze as she sat down.

(Kyouka was suddenly _keenly_ aware of her heartbeat, as it had, for whatever reason, just skipped a step.)

She tried to brush him off with a chuckle of sorts but probably came off as awkward and nervous. "Well, I mean, it's not that I _don't_ have friends. It's just that—"

"—They're all busy with their own things today," Kaminari finished for her, stunning her into silence. "And you don't really want to bother them with your own things, so you've just resigned yourself to being lonely in the band room until people start showing up for call time."

Kyouka stared at him and thought, _What the fuck?_

Kaminari grinned and leaned back, cradling his head with his arms crossed behind it. "Well, if you feel lonely, then at least you've got me to feel lonely with you. Two lonely, lonely people just trying to feel a little less lonely together."

"Don't do that," was all Kyouka could say to him.

He quirked an eyebrow at her. "Do what?" he asked.

"Put your feet up on the table," she said, gesturing to his shoes, which were dangerously close to dirtying her math homework. "We don't really clean this all that often, you know, but we need it for band council meetings."

"Oh, whoops." Kaminari immediately retracted his legs, his shoes landing on the thin, carpet floor with a dull _thud. _"Anyway, I should probably do _my_ homework too. I don't wanna get home late and _still_ have math leftover. Have you got the textbook pages?"

"I'll send them to you." She sent him the pictures of their textbook.

"Thank youuu~"

Kyouka exchanged her phone for her pencil once more and stared again at the problem that had been haunting her for the last few minutes.

_sin⁵(x)cos²(x) = (cos²(x) - 2cos⁴(x) + cos⁶(x))sin(x)_

She heard Kaminari let out a small sigh and, again eager for the sweet release of a distraction, looked up at him. "What's up?" she asked.

"Oh," said Kaminari dully, not bothering to look up. "I forgot my earbuds at home today. Music makes the math go by faster."

"Then just play it out loud. I don't care," Kyouka loftily replied. (Secretly, she craved the sound of music to fill the empty band room as well.)

"Can't." Kaminari pulled a battery pack connected to his phone out of his bag and waved it at her. "Apple."

"Ew," she said, wrinkling her nose at him. "And you don't even have airpods to go with it? For shame."

"I'm just a poor boy; nobody loves me!"

"He's just a poor boy, from a poor family," Kyouka automatically filled in.

Kaminari flashed her a grin, the cold, awkward atmosphere _finally_ starting to warm up for real. _"__Spare him his life from this monstrosity,"_ he sang. It was a little throaty but surprisingly, not all that bad.

"Hang on a sec, I think I have the song on my phone," Kyouka said, denying him her own singing voice. (She did not miss that this made him briefly pout at her again.) She put her pencil between her teeth (so that on the off chance that he might ask her, she had an excuse not to sing) and unlocked her phone.

"Oooh, I should have known someone like you would shell out for that sweet, sweet Spotify Premium," Kaminari said.

"Nah, man, fuck that noise," Kyouka said, her tongue tripping over the pencil just a little. "I just rip music from my parents' old CDs and use an mp3 player app. It's free, _and_ I can choose whatever song I wanna play _and_ skip over any one I want _whenever _I feel like it." She hit _Bohemian Rhapsody_ and raised her phone volume for the both of them, but soon, she spat out her pencil, clicking her tongue as she wiped it down.

"What is it?" Kaminari asked as her phone began to sing.

"Battery's running low," she replied with half a tiny sigh at the end. "We're probably gonna have to stop after this song."

Kaminari's eyes brightened, and he held up a finger to signal her to wait a moment. "Wait, I got this," he said, and he dug around in his backpack for a second.

"Are you _kidding_ me?" Kyouka asked when he pulled out what looked like a whole _store's_ worth of spare batteries and slid one over to her. "What the actual _fuck,_ Pikachu?"

Kaminari shrugged. "Hey, it pays to be prepared!"

"That's true," Kyouka admitted, thinking of Momo and her pockets full of everything. (What _couldn't_ Momo conjure was anyone's guess. Dark matter? So far, there hadn't been any proof that she _couldn't.)_ She pulled her charger cord out of her backpack and plugged in her phone. "Thanks, I guess."

"Heh, heh, _no problemo, _my lady-o~" Kaminari dramatically and obnoxiously swept his long, black and blond bangs out of his eyes and winked at her.

Kyouka brushed her own bangs out of her eyes, just to make sure he had a good view of her _rolling _them.

Kaminari took his hand out of his hair and pouted at her for a second, then just laughed. The both of them returned to their homework, Kyouka starting again in earnest now that she had something to listen to.

Their easy silence lasted quite a while, until a couple songs later when Kaminari spoke up again.

"You sing really well," he said, just barely louder than her phone volume.

"Huh?" _Where did that—_ she suddenly realized that her habit of humming along had started slipping out. Her face flushed. "Oh, um. Thanks."

"You know what would be cool? If you sang the national anthem at our games or something. I bet the crowd would love you! I can hear the announcer guy now: _'__Conducting tonight: Jirou Kyouka, head drum major and vocalist for the national anthem!'_ It would be super awesome!" he continued, even bouncing in his seat a little.

Kyouka tugged at one of her earlobes, fiddling a bit with the cartilage. "I guess," she said, trying to ignore the burning heat radiating off her cheeks. _"__But."_

She let go of her ear, and Kaminari quieted his fidgeting.

"But?" he asked, prompting her to elaborate.

"I don't know! I guess maybe sometimes I'm tired of always being the one performing! Maybe _I'd_ like to be the one in the stands one of these days, watching and listening to everyone play." She shut her mouth, surprised at her own outburst.

"Holy shit," said Kaminari. "Are you okay?"

Kyouka let out a breath, focusing on her tension so that it could escape. "I'm fine," she said. "It's not that I don't enjoy being in band and all. I love music; it's been my life all my life." She rested her cheek on her hand and stared at the wall. "I guess it's just like what my parents always told me every time I told them I wanted to join the industry. You can't always be out there producing, producing, producing something new. Sometimes you just have to sit back and enjoy the show, drink in what you've missed and take in all the food for thought so that you don't run out of juice halfway through."

She flicked her gaze over to the trombone player for a moment, but he said nothing. He simply stared, his silence an invitation for her to continue.

But she only shrugged. "Guess I'm just a little bit tired," she said, stretching out her arms. "But don't worry. I still love playing in band. I'll make it through just fine."

"Can you really sustain yourself on love alone, though?"

Kyouka paused and looked at him curiously. "…What do you mean?"

"It's like, did you even _listen_ to any of the things your parents told you?" Kaminari asked, and whatever lofty treatment she was giving this conversation fell away right then. "They said you can't pour from an empty cup, not that love alone's gonna put drink _in_ the cup. You said you loved _playing_ in band, but you haven't been playing _with _us a whole lot lately." He peered at her with hardened gaze. "Are you _really_ okay?"

"I—" Something caught in Kyouka's throat, keeping her words inside, so she swallowed down her beating, pounding heart. _(What the fuck?_ she thought._What. The. ACTUAL. Fuck?)_ She steeled her gaze and peered straight back at him, opened her mouth and—

Kaminari looked away.

Kyouka's eyes softened, and she closed her mouth, softly, gently. A beat of silence passed between the two of them, during which Kyouka continued to stare at him, but he did not return it.

"I'm fine," she said, right at the same moment he said, "Sorry for prying again."

Silence again, although her phone played on, apparently now deciding that this was the best time for 70s icons ABBA to start playing. Really added to the drama of it all, the way "Winner Takes It All" just came on like that.

Kyouka let it go.

"Anyway," she said, scrambling to find her pencil again only to find it right there in her hands still. "Basketball games are a lot more chill than football games. No halftime, no uniforms, just us in the stands, playing pep tunes and cheering Kendou on."

Kaminari stretched out his arms. "Actually, we should practice together!" he said, eyeing the instrument lockers nearby.

"Oh yeah?" Kyouka asked, already chucking her pencil back into its case. "What do you wanna play? The _Pokémon_ theme?"

"Actually, the _Sailor Moon_ theme song is my favorite pep tune," Kaminari answered, carelessly flipping his notebook shut and shoving it into his backpack.

"The _Sailor Moon_ theme?" Kyouka stood up and pushed in her chair. "Then where did Pikachu come from?" She picked up her phone and noticed the battery pack again. "Or, actually—"

"Oh, I wore this one woolen beanie a lot way back in freshman year, and since it was kinda small, I had to keep kinda pulling it over my head and stuff, which ended up with me giving a lot of people static shocks every time we touched," Kaminari explained, jumping over the table to get to the other side quicker.

They trotted past the grand pianos and into their actual playing area together.

"…Huh," Kyouka said as they wove their way through the messy, ever-changing maze of chairs and music stands to get to their lockers. She pulled his battery pack out of her pocket and waved it at him. "Are you sure this has _nothing_ to do with it?"

Kaminari almost tripped over a stand to look in her direction, but fortunately, he managed to catch himself against a chair. "I mean, once you _have_ the nickname and reputation, might as well lean into it." He squeezed past the final row of chairs and stood on his tiptoes to better see his lock as Kyouka crouched down to get at her own.

"By the way," he said a minute later, delicately sliding his trombone case out just enough for it to fall the rest of the way into his arms, "who's conducting tonight anyway?"

Kyouka— who had long since put a reed in her mouth to soak and was, in fact, already nearly done assembling her instrument— finished throwing her neck strap over her head before taking the reed out to talk. "Uhhh, I don't know," she said. "Let me text Bakugou. I don't think we ever decided." She placed her reed back on her tongue where it belonged and took out her phone.

[3:46 p.m.]

**_[Little Miss Headset]: hey bakugou  
[Little Miss Headset]: you're gonna conduct for the girls' bball today_**

_[Major Explodey-Pants]:__Bitch_

Kyouka shut off her phone, took the reed out of her mouth, and lined it up with the mouthpiece. "He said sure," she said as she tightened the ligature screws.

"Oh, niceee." Kaminari nodded so vigorously, Kyouka wouldn't have been surprised if his mistakenly launched his head off his shoulders.

"I'll be doing the boys' game, though," she continued, somewhat under her breath, so focused was she on getting her ligature right. She then slid the mouthpiece onto her sax, clipped it onto her neck strap, and stood up to do a test scale.

Kaminari clapped like some sort of _peasant _when she was finished, but the gesture made her smile anyway. "That was really good!"

Kyouka settled into one of the nearby chairs and swiped up one of the tuners some poor kid left behind on a nearby stand. "We'll see about _that,"_ she said as he put his own instrument together. She turned on the tuner, played a simple B-flat, and fiddled with the mouthpiece until the light hit green.

Kaminari jumped over the back of a chair and onto the seat, hopped off said seat, and then plopped his butt down into that very same seat. "I could _not_ hear the difference between _any_ of those notes," he said, very carefully settling his trombone onto his lap.

"Oh, well, rip to you _peasants,_ but I'm _different,"_ Kyouka said, digging her music out of her sax case and dumping it onto the stand in front of her.

"Well, I hope you find what _this_ peasant has to present to you to be very _pleasant,"_ Kaminari quipped, readying his own music folder on the stand right next to hers.

"Oh, yeah? Well, what does the peasant have to present to me?" Kyouka asked, tapping her fingers against her bell.

Kaminari hoisted his trombone onto his shoulder, did some sort of eyebrow thing at her, and began playing _Careless Whisper. _

Kyouka crossed her arms and listened to everything he had with a straight face. Yes, even when it became clear he'd reached the end of the parts he had practiced. Yes, even when he had to keep going back a few measures to redo a phrase for the _third _time. _Yes,_ even when he stopped and said, "Okay, that's all I've got," before the end of the song.

"That was horrible," she said.

"I know," he replied.

"Your tuning was terrible."

"I could not tell."

"Your slurs were _very _messy."

"That's part of the fun, in my opinion."

"And you didn't even get all the rhythms right."

"Well, they _sounded_ right to me."

"You owe me five hundred dollars for making me listen to that."

"What if I took you out on a date and we called it even?"

"No."

(She would not even humor him on that.)

Kaminari snapped in a very, _"__aww, rats!"_ fashion and said, "Dang it."

"You also owe _Mr. Aizawa _five hundred dollars and a penny for disappointing him like that," Kyouka added.

"I'll just take him out on a date, too, then," he joked.

Kyouka made a face. "That's gross. You _disgust_ me. Never say anything like that ever again. Drum major's orders."

Kaminari frowned a bit, as a joke. "Okay, sir-or-ma'am~" he sing-songed.

Kyouka opened her music folder and dug around for her _Sailor Moon_ half sheet, and as she did so, Kaminari began humming something _impossibly_ familiar in a way that she just _could not place_ for whatever reason.

"What _is_ that song?" she asked him as she finally tracked down her sheet music and pulled it out of its badly half-organized collection.

"Oh, it's the _Puella Magi Madoka Magica_ opening!" Kaminari cheerfully replied, tossing his whole folder to the ground after pulling his own music out. "We watched it at the kegger over break because it was Sero's turn to choose the show."

"Huh," said Kyouka out loud, but in her head, she had no idea what to think or say or do because she swore she heard that very song playing in her head over and over at some point over winter break. "That's…" she struggled to come up with the words to articulate herself.

Fortunately, Kaminari didn't seem to really notice, simply humming to himself some more before practically _farting_ out a few notes on his trombone. (What was that? His warm up? Kind of late for that, now.)

She stared at him, still not quite all there, until he stopped, lowered his trombone, and flashed her a grin.

"So," he began (and Kyouka's heart skipped a beat, startled, then sped up as if to make up for what it had missed), "shall we begin?"

Kyouka stuttered out a few random, meaningless syllables as she quickly looked back and forth between her sheet music on her stand and Kaminari's face, getting a good look at absolutely neither of them. (Why was she such a mess today?) "Well, actually—" she tore her gaze away from the blond boy so fast and so hard, she briefly shut up "—y-you're actually the one who should be starting, since… since I just have a couple measures of rest."

"Oh, really?" Kaminari said, leaning over to check out her music, still somehow oblivious to the way she was doing _pretty much everything. _"I never noticed."

"You still don't listen to anyone else when playing, huh?" Kyouka commented dryly. She began snapping, almost absently so, to keep the beat for him. "It really is a miracle that Mr. Aizawa let you into this band, isn't it?"

Kaminari adjusted the weight of his instrument on his shoulder as he got ready to play. "Must be that I'm just _that _talented," he joked.

"Uhuh," Kyouka said as he began, half to herself, really. Her fingers quickly grew tired of snapping, so she said, "Look at me," and transitioned to some half-proper conducting for all of two seconds before she realized she had her own part to play. Swearing under her breath, she picked up her sax, and, rapidly scanning her music for their place, hopped into the song with the melody, listening carefully to Kaminari's part, hoping against hope that he could at least count for himself in his head.

And, surprisingly, it seemed he could. They got through a couple measures together like that, sounding pretty okay, with Kaminari consistently nailing his eighth notes and Kyouka picking up the melody, but, of course, all good things must come to an end, and this good thing lasted just under thirty seconds before Kyouka stopped them both, her ears having caught a mistake.

"You held onto that note too long, and it was going to throw off all your other rhythms," she explained, leaning over to mark it on his music with a pencil. It wasn't all that uncommon of a mistake— she heard it around sometimes, when the band was practicing all together— so she was just a _little_ bit mad that he hadn't fixed it yet. (She tried not to let it show too much, though, since she hadn't been taught to snap at people trying so earnestly to practice.)

"Oh, whoops," Kaminari said. "Must be a bad habit."

"You seem to have an awful lot of those," Kyouka dryly replied, playing with her pencil a bit and facing him fully. "Play those two measures correctly for me a couple times, see if that breaks it."

"Okie dokie, dude!" He straightened out his posture, lifted up his bell, and played for her.

Kyouka kept time for him, tapping her pencil against the seat of her chair. There was something oddly familiar about the way he played in general too, now that she had the opportunity to pay so much attention to it all by itself, though she couldn't for the life of her figure out why.

_(Was he perhaps her soulmate?)_

She dismissed the thought just as quickly as it popped into her mind. If she let her mind wander, she'd lose the beat, after all. Besides, it was probably just a coincidence.

"Is that good enough?" Kaminari asked once he started getting the hang of it.

Kyouka shook her head, still keeping perfect time with her pencil. "One more time, with feeling."

"Ah," said Kaminari. "'Cause if I put my heart into it, I'll look stellar, huh?"

Kyouka finally stopped her counting. "Shut up," she said, giving him one of those friendly punches in the arm. "No one cares how you look right now, pretty boy. All I care about is how you sound."

"Sounds to _me _like you think I'm _pretty,"_ Kaminari said with a grin. "And that sounds _pretty good_ to me."

Kyouka was just about to whip up some snippy response when the band room doors swung open, and both she and Kaminari turned to see who it was walking in.

"Oh, Kouda!" Kyouka stood up as her Japanese partner walked into the room. "We're waiting for call time and practicing right now; wanna join us?"

The tall boy's cheeks flushed red, and he broke into an excited smile, nodding along. He put his stuff down, hurried over to his locker, and just as he pulled out his clarinet case, Kaminari set his trombone down on a nearby chair.

"I need to go take a leak," the blond boy declared to no one in particular, and, without even waiting for Kyouka's or anyone's response, stumbled through the chair maze and walked out the door right as Kouda shuffled over to where Kyouka was still seated.

"…Huh," Kyouka said, once again at a loss for words. It seemed she was very frequently at a loss when it came to Kaminari lately; perhaps he was killing off her last few brain cells somehow. That would be a shame; he was so much fun to be around, with his stupid wit and humor. "That was pretty sudden."

Kouda shrugged at her, softly playing a B-flat scale to warm up.

"Sit down," Kyouka said to him as she pulled up a chair, and he complied. She pulled out her phone to check the time as he continued warming up.

"It's a lot later than I thought," she said aloud as she pocketed her phone again.

"Almost call time," Kouda softly added. He adjusted his grip on his clarinet, the keys clacking ever so softly as he did so.

Kyouka heard a door open again and looked up, not expecting Kaminari to be back so soon— except that it wasn't him. It was Mr. Aizawa, finally shuffling out of his office to get ready for the basketball game.

She didn't see Kaminari again until call time, when she caught a brief glimpse of him picking up his trombone again and practically running out the door. He had Kirishima's baritone under one arm as Kirishima himself struggled after him, all done up in Mina's bells harness, likely because her choreo practices ran until after Aizawa would close up the band room.

She walked across campus with Yaomomo. While she still listened intently to her best friend chatter about the date she'd had that afternoon with Todo-dorky, she still found her thoughts strangely drifting in the direction of Kaminari. _Why had he gotten up and left so quickly? Why had he taken so long in the restroom?_ (Not that she should be judging that last sort of thing, but it wasn't like everything was really sitting well and adding up in her mind anyway.)

She shook her thoughts away as she and Momo stepped to the gym, the warm, stuffy air hitting her face all at once and making the whole basketball game feel real. They walked up the stairs to the second floor of bleachers together, where the rest of the band was, Momo's chatter a little lost to the blasting of the _Space Jam_ theme and general chaos of a gym waiting for a sports game to start.

"'Sup," she said to Bakugou as she passed him by.

Bakugou merely grunted, lounging against the railing like he didn't _really_ want to be there as his own roundabout way of asserting the fact that he was, in fact, in charge and up front of the rest of the band.

Kyouka stole a glance up at the topmost row of the wooden bleachers and caught a glimpse of those familiar shocks of red and yellow hair up in a corner. She let herself have a quiet breath of relief, though she couldn't really tell why she was so relieved. (She didn't want to think about it too much either, thank you very much.)

The girls' basketball game passed very much as normal. Most everyone had brought some form of homework down to work on, but almost no one was _actually_ working on it. The flutes were playing Uno with the clarinets, the trumpets kept challenging people to arm wrestling matches, and the tubas kept on finding excuses to play _"__Hey, Baby!"_ for no reason other than that it was fun for everyone to join in on the bad singing.

Kendou came bounding up the stairs after the game, still in her basketball shorts, still a little bit sweaty, and still a little bit out of breath.

"Hey," she said to Kyouka, waving tiredly. "Thanks for letting me borrow your sax."

"No problem," Kyouka automatically replied, sliding her own mouthpiece off and scooting over for the other girl.

Kyouka ran downstairs to wash out her mouthpiece, for whatever reason noticing Kaminari and Kirishima dicking around in line for refreshments as she passed them by. The bathroom was strangely quiet, with just the soft, electric hum of the lights and gentle whooshing of the running faucet.

She hummed to herself, the sound of her voice echoing off the tiled walls and filling the emptiness with something tangible and less lonely. (It really was almost _terrifyingly _quiet in there…)

When she returned upstairs, she found Bakugou running around barefoot, setting up a drumset with the help of Mina. She raised an eyebrow but said nothing, instead scanning the stands for other familiar faces that, for whatever reason, she could not find.

She leant against the railing and checked again, finding his trombone neatly seated on one of the higher stands, right next to an equally abandoned baritone. She frowned.

(She wondered where they ran off to.)

* * *

_"__Hey, Kirishima, didn't you say that you wanted to talk more about something that happened at the kegger?"_

_"__Yeah! Wanna do that now?"_

_"__Yeah, c'mon, let's go outside."_

* * *

**_author's note xv. _**_aaa i remember this chapter took a long time to write and i mean. it DID end up as a really long chapter. love how it took fifteen whole chapters to show our leads practicing together lol.  
_

_you might be able to guess, thanks to those last lines, that the next chapter will cover the last of the kegger! and then after next week i think we're gonna have to go on a month break or smth. next arc is just february and then we get into the TOUR. ARC. CCC:_

_i chose "sports" by beach bunny for this chapter's title because well, it's a basketball game. i think i almost titled chapter 12 sports (for the lyrics "if you feel lonely, i could be lonely with you"), but then it switched to lollipop, and then i almost named this chapter baobabs (after the regina spektor song) and 16 sports, but then i realized, "oh shit i could switch those titles around. and then the lyrics mentioned i almost picked this song for chapter 12 kind of describe the vibe going on in this chapter: the two of them have no one else to hang out with, so they hang out together in the band room. kouda showing up this chapter was a bit of a surprise: he wasn't supposed to be introduced until chapter 17, but he plays his own little role. (well, if you're reading chronologically, you already know that c;)_

_anyway you guys know the drill. thank you for reading, follow/fave if you're new, follow me on tumblr (**a-piece-of-shipping-trash**), or picarto (**HuaFeiHua**) for weekly streams where i don't shut up. leave a review, and stay safe out there._

* * *

**Next Chronologically: **Rhythm 10 / Moment 17


	16. Baobabs

**Previous Chronologically:** Rhythm 7 / Moment 12 **| Happening Concurrently: **Moment 14

* * *

**Word Count: **2,542

* * *

[12:08 p.m.]

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _sorry she ended up dragging me off to the food court for lunch  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _it's almost two rn_

_**[Pikachu]: o  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_wat did u have 4 lunch**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _some really shitty mall food court takeout  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _*( __￣皿￣__)_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_dude  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_u know wat i could go 4 rn  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_some fukin,,  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_toyomitsu's**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _what's that_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_D:  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_WAIT  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_U DONT KNOW TOYOMITSUS**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _no?_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_ITS ONLY THE *B E S T* FUKIN DELI  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_BY SCHOOL  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_HAVE U RLLY NEVER BEEN THERE**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _yaomomo usually prefers boba shops n bakeries  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _like dragon's breath_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_dude  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_im legally obligated 2 take u 2 the deli now**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _lol ok_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_dude trust me  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_the 1st time kiri n i had sandwiches there  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_it was like a spiritual journey  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_we had spiritual journeys  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_that is how good their fukin sandwiches r**_

[2:47 p.m.]

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _sorry__  
[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _my phone ran out of battery  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _just got back to my aunt's house to charge it bc my parents wouldn't let me bring the spare battery b S_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_ahh  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_its fine  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_we kind of ended up going off on a series of shenanigans anyways  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_werep at bakugous house nwo**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ "_we"?_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_o  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_frogot to tell u i guess  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_squad keggers today**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _first of all ,, ,  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _/frogot/  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _second of all_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_FORGOT  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_I MEANT FORGOT  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_;-;;**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _dang i can't believe you're at baku's house_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_kirishima b putting in those hours  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_u3u**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _they're putting a lot of effort into this_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_YEAH**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _like i guess lately i was kind of thinking of lying to my relatives here abt having a bf or smth  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _bc they won't shut the fuck up abt if i have one yet (╬▔__皿▔__)╯  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _but fake dating also.  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _sounds like a lot of work_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_well if ur in town 4 a catfish**_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_[file attached: 20200528_**__**193944\. jpg]  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_i gotchu  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_:3**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _wtf are you wearing  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _are your fucking keggers like  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _formal attire or some shit_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_o  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_that was from a relative's wedding a while back**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _also while i'm thinking abt it__  
[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _are you talking about like  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _ACTUAL keggers with like__**  
**__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _alcohol n shit_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_did u not see the meme i sent b4 u left  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_i never go back on my ninja ways**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _or like_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_do i need 2 send it again**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _oh so it was a joke_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_*saying this she casually threw aside a large rock***_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _lol you caught me  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _had it not been for the frozen ground outside i would have absolutely picked up a rock as your souvenir_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_hold up  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_1  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_frozen ground?  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_and 2**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _it's minnesota, pikachu_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_ur getting me a souvenir?**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _it snows here in the winter_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_o  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_right**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _you know, the white powdery stuff that floats down from the sky_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_u know  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_i thought snow was made up until i was in 3rd grade**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _i'd say like the equivalent of us having water fall from the sky but  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _wait  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _what the /fuck/  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _also just to finish my previous sentence california_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_2 be fair,, ,  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_we do not get snow in california  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_n i am but a simple cali bithc kid  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_bitch kid**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _fuck yeah you a bitch_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_:c  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_r00d  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_but anyways  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_r u actually getting me a souvenir**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _yes_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_bc you rlly dont have to**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _i'm going to bring you some snow  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _bc it's free  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _( •̀ ω •́ )y_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_kirishima says he wants one of ur minnesota rocks if ur not gonna throw it me  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_he says its 4 his rock collection**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _if i can find one i guess i might as well  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _i found bakuboi one of those grow your own crystals kits at the science museum  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _since he's all lol chem nerd n shit_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_wait  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_so who else r u buying things 4**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _well yaomomo obviously  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _bc yaomomo is bae (✿◡‿◡)  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _kouda, since he's pretty chill  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _he sits next to me in japanese  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _he's v sweet (*__3__)  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _a couple senpai you probs don't know  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _n maybe kendou  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _if i can find her smth_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_why kendou  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_i didnt know u guys were that close**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _ehh  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _alto sax solidarity  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _and also i work with her a lot bc she's band president_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_can i ask why**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _what do you mean_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_so  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_over the summer  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_n at the triband practices n stuff  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_i kinda heard people talk abt how kendou stole fuwa senpais place as ua band president during sectionals**_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_kiri told me it had smth to do w mr aizawa taking over after mr yagi retired freshman yr  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_but none of his senpai were involved or smth**_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_i guess im asking wat thats all abt**_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_jirou?**_

[3:19 p.m.]

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _sorry  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _one of my aunts was sad that my hair's too short for her to french braid  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _so we ended up having me record her french braid my dad's hair instead ( •̀ ω •́ )_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_o i c**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _basically the thing w/kendou is that traditionally  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _the band president is a senior  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _usually they were secretary the year before  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _and so by all accounts everyone just kinda assumed fuwa was gonna be president this year right  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _interviews roll around in may_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_yee**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _monoma nominates kendou for band president as a joke  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _n she ends up being fuwa's only competition__  
[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _and so aizawa  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _is a lot stricter on the upperclassmen than mr. yagi had been_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_:eyes:**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _n so a lot of juniors n some seniors at the time had this kind of tension w/him  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _and even tho i was in council at the time everyone was kinda busy w/other stuff n i didn't have a lot of official power  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _anyway it's all kind of a blur but pretty much fuwa senpai had a bad interview  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _and then at bandquet when kendou won_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_wats bandquet**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _end of the year banquet for band  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _lots of stuff happens blah blah blah  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _anyway the whole band was caught off guard when she won, n so people started speculating that aizawa rigged the election so that there wouldn't be anyone in major band power who seriously opposed him_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_holy shit**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _y e a h_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_so then  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_wat IS the truth**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _what do you mean_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_did kendou actually get the job through favoritism**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _i don't know  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _but it is what it is  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _and despite it all she's been a good person to have around_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_hmm yeah  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_she seems v reliable**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _she's p busy a lot of the time but  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _she rlly is_

[4:15 p.m.]

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _hey are you going on tour over spring break_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_fuck yeah  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_kiri told me it slaps  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_he said u guys went down to san diego freshman year  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_n that u guys went to the aquarium  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_dude dude dude  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_i remember he came back w like  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_at LEAST 3 stuffed sharks**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _was that him?_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_hang on  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_i think this was b4 he started dying his hair  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_lemme ask**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _i mostly just followed senpai around for that trip since i was under the impression that there weren't any other freshmen around  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _bakuboi was at shiketsu at the time n tododorky didn't go  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _we still don't really let freshmen into marching band_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_is it different at ketsuketsu**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _if you mean ketsubutsu then i have no idea  
__[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _if you mean shiketsu then you can just ask bakugou_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_o  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_ketsuketsu is just what the squad calls shiketsu n ketsubutsu as like  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_a singular entity**_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _that's really dumb_

_**_**[Pikachu]: **_[file attached: you got me there. jpg]  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_anyways  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_r u looking forward to the rose parade next yr  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_everyones p certain ur gonna b leading the triband  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_thats gotta b pretty cool  
**__**_**[Pikachu]: **_*finger guns***_

_[Doki-Doki Music Club]:_ _hang on it's time for dinner_

Denki stared at his phone screen until it shut off on its own, and for several long minutes afterwards, continued turning it on immediately. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he briefly heard the start of a little piano melody— he wondered what exactly it was that Jirou was listening to at the moment— but it stopped pretty soon after it started.

He sighed and let his phone fall asleep for real this time, wriggling around from his place atop the couch in Bakugou's living room so that he could pocket it for the time being. To his left, Mina looked up at him from her position on one of the armrests, but since the _Madoka_ episodes had just started getting _really _intense, she didn't say anything. _(Yet.)_

"Hey, Kirishima," Denki whispered, doing his best to reach down and shake the redhead's shoulder. "Pass me another box of apple juice."

As Kirishima mumbled incoherently (but otherwise did nothing), Mina sent him another suspicious glance.

"Don't you mean _applini juicelini?"_ she asked, helping him shake Kirishima anyway.

"Where the _fuck_ do you guys get this kind of shit," muttered Bakugou, whose arm Kirishima had been almost _aggressively _cuddling for the last two hours.

"The applini juicelini?" Denki asked, eventually giving up on getting Kirishima to move and signalling to Mina to get him a box instead. "From Walmart."

"_No!_ I meant—"

"_Shhh!"_ hissed Sero, who was sitting on the other armrest, right next to Bakugou. "I'm _trying_ to watch _Madoka!"_

"Dude, isn't this like, your third time watching?" Mina asked as she settled back into her place on the opposing armrest.

"It has one of those stories that requires multiple viewings to fully appreciate," Sero replied, briefly taking his eyes off the TV screen to toss the squad's token girl a hard look.

Mina simply stuffed a whole sugar cookie into her mouth like some sort of furious squirrel and showed him a very particular finger.

However, before anyone (namely Bakugou) could yell at her for possibly getting crumbs between the couch cushions, the ending theme began to play, and Mina jumped up out of her own accord.

"Episode's over!" she cheered, then spun around a couple times before pointing straight at Denki. "Tell us more about Kyouka, Denki!"

"She's pretty, and I like her," Denki said, folding his arms across his chest. "What else is there to say?"

"But do you _liiiike-_like her?" Sero teased, a shit-eating grin upon his face.

Denki used all his strength to yank a throw pillow out from beneath Bakugou's ass and threw it full force into Sero's face as an answer. (Bakugou, for some reason, allowed this.) "Just hit the next episode button already, next-episode-button-hitter," he commanded.

But Mina was waggling her eyebrows, and that was _absolutely_ not a good sign, at least not for Denki. "But do you _liiiiike-_like her?" she sang. "What do you _liiiike_ about her, Denki dear?"

If Denki had access to more throw pillows, he'd have definitely thrown them at this point, but instead, he groaned and let the back of his head hit the wall, strangely embarrassed by the whole spectacle.

"Answer the question, Pikachu!" Bakugou, of all people, barked.

"What, are you gonna _tell_ her or something?" Denki squawked, freeing one of his feet from where it had been pinned under his butt to give Bakugou a friendly kick between the shoulders. "You can't _do _that! You can't just mess with a man's _crush _like that, bro! That is a _sacred trust—"_

"What, you think I can't keep my mouth shut?" Bakugou snapped, finally twisting his arm free from Kirishima the koala-boy to smack Denki's leg away from him. "I'm not some loose-lipped _loser."_

"Oh, shit, dat alliteration," Sero said with a laugh.

Kirishima and Mina joined in on the laughter, but Denki didn't really hear it. He'd grown lost in his own thoughts, cycling over and over around one particular line he let fall from his lips just now.

He had a _crush_ on Jirou.

This wasn't just some sort of silly, "oh, ha-ha, we're soulmates, so you should try dating or at least being friends with me!" kind of thing to him anymore. This was… this was _serious business_ now.

He stared at his hands as he tucked his legs back under him to sit criss-cross applesauce atop the couch in Bakugou's living room. For some reason, he hadn't expected to get to this point. (Whatever "_this point"_ meant or entailed.) And yet here he was.

The next episode of _Madoka_ began to play.

* * *

**_Author's Note xvi. _**_aight and if you don't read rhythm, this is the laaaaast chapter of the kegger arc! i'm gonna be taking an approximately month-long break now to kind of like. y'know. recover from this really fast update schedule recently wao. i'm basically out of chapter queue now -A- i must get my padding back! but school has started and the apartment, while chiller, is still a chaotic mess. _

_i chose "baobabs" by regina spektor for this chapter's title because uhh. i forgot lol. probably something for the lines "how am i supposed to be? i don't have my thorns now"_

_anyway dorky boy denki has finally realized he's got a serious crush going on. like, this isn't Casual Crush time, no this is_ **Seeeeerious **_crush time. still gonna be over on tumblr (as **a-piece-of-shipping-trash**) and streaming over on picarto (as **HuaFeiHua**) chatting endlessly about working on this au, so hey! be sure to follow me there. streams are always on at 7 p.m. PST~ thanks for reading, leave a review, and stay safe out there_

* * *

**Next Chronologically: **Moment 35


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